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Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive 
in 2010 with funding from 
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http://www.archive.org/details/emperorjulianOOrend 



THE 



EMPEROR JULIAN 



PAGANISM AND CHEISTIANITY 



WITH GENEALOGICAL, CHRONOLOGICAL AND 
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL APPENDICES. 



BEING THE HULSEAN ESSAY FOR THE YEAR 1876. 




BV 



GERALD HENRY RENDALL, M.A. 

FEtLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 



DEIGHTON, BELL, AND CO. 

LONDON: GEORGE BELL AND SONS. 

1879 



<: 






PATRI CARISSIMO 

CVI REFERO ACQEPTVM 

SI QVID VEL POTVI VEL POTERO 

HAS DEDICO PRIMITIAS 



THE LAST OBACLE 
A.D. 361. 

EiVare t0 ^aaikrfC, xo-P-o-l iriae daldaXos avXd' 
ovKiri ^ol^os ^xet Ka\6j3av, ov /j.dvTi8a McpvTjv, 
ov trayav 'Kakiovaav aTrea^ero Kal \d\ov vdaip. 

Dark the shrine and dumb the fount of song thence welling, 

Save for words more sad than tears of blood, that said : 
Tell the king, on earth has fallen the glorious divelling, 

And the watersprings that spake are quenched and dead. 
Not a cell is left the God, no roof, no cover; 

In his hand the prophet laurel flowers no more. 
And the great king's high sad heart, thy true last lover, 
Felt thine answer pierce and cleave it to the core. 
And he bowed down his hopeless head 
In the drift of the wild world's tide, 
And dying. Thou hast conquered, he said, 
Galilean; he said it, and died. 



PREFACE. 

I OWE it to the indulgence of the Trustees of Mr Hulse's 
benefaction that I have been enabled to mend and finish 
much that was faulty and imperfect in this Essay as sub- 
mitted more than two years ago to the Examiners. The 
Introduction — which makes no pretension to research and 
merely gathered up some thoughts suggested by preliminary 
reading — has been abridged, and rigorously stripped of all 
expansions and unnecessary illustrations. What remains of 
it I have spared rather from tenderness for its prescriptive 
right to appear in print than from any sense of its intrinsic 
worth. The body of the work has been treated to pruning 
here and readjustment there, and to more of augmentation 
than either. I have not stinted fulness of treatment, more 
sanguine of making my Essay thorough and true, than 
popular or entertaining. Chapters ill. and vii. have been 
so rewritten as* to be almost new, and the same may be 
said of much of the last Chapter. The Appendices, though 
prepared in germ, were of course not inflicted upon the 
first readers of the Essay, and aspire only to be serviceable 
to this or that special student. 

Ancient and modern authorities — as the closing Appendix 
may attest — furnish wide fields for the student of Julian's 
acts and motives. Through by far the greater part of these 
I have found time and opportunity to roam. Much as I 
am in debt to judgments passed by other minds on materials 
open to all, I trust that no facts are now imported into this 
Essay which do not find warrant in the pages of the old 
writers. Whatever in the first scramble of Prize Essay 



X PREFACE. 

writing I jotted down at second hand, I have since been 
able to verify, and according to its proper weight and con- 
text co-ordinate or exclude. References to the prime au- 
thorities — to Julian's own works in the margin, to the 
writings of others in the foot-notes — I have appended 
freely, but — except where conscious of a direct debt in 
thought or expression — have not been at ill-spent pains to 
multiply corroborative citations from later critics. 

Two hundred years ago the Apostate's career furnished 
English Pamphleteers with food for piquant and voluminous 
controversy. A century has run since the great author of 
The Decline and Fall compiled his masterly narration of 
Julian's successes and failures : it must remain the wonder 
and despair of rivals. It seems indeed to have scared com- 
petitors from the field. French brilliance, German thought, 
Danish imagination have all had their say, but Gibbon's 
countrymen have honoured their greatest by silence. It 
needed some external impulse to call out a successor, and 
a gentle violence to drive him into print. I can only be 
grateful that Alma Mater has supplied both incentives for 
work that has been full of pleasure in the execution. 

To De Broglie preeminently among Frenchmen, to 
Neander, to Miicke, to Strauss, and in a less degree to 
Rode, Semisch and the like among Germans, I tender 
thanks for the suggestive labours of which I have reaped 
the fruits, the value and helpfulness of which I inadequately 
requite by this general acknowledgment. 

I must close with thanking my friend and brother-fellow 
Rev. V. H. Stanton of Trinity College for hi§ kindness in 
reading my proofs as they passed the Press, and aiding me 
with wise corrections and suggestions. 

G. H. R. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



•pages 1 — 22 






PAGE 




26 



Intboductiok 

CHAPTEE I. 
Eeligious Policy of Constantine and Constantius 

OHAPTEE II. 
Julian's Boyhood, Youth, Educatiou, and Cassarehip 35 

CHAPTEE III. 
Neo-Platonism 62 

CHAPTEE IV. 
Julian's Theology 74 

CHAPTEE V. 
Julian's Idea of Eeligion ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 103 

CHAPTEE VI. 

Julian's Personal Eeligion ... ... ... ... ... 127 

CHAPTEE VII. 
Julian's Administration ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 150 

CHAPTEE VIII. 

Persecution under Julian ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 176 

Section I. Acts of Persecution, p. 176 — 203. 
Section II. Educational Policy, p. 203—216.. 
Section III. Estimates of Julian, p. 216 — 227. 



xil TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER IX. PAGE 

Jalian and Chrietiauity 228 

CHAPTER X. 

Julian and HelleniBiii ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 240 

CHAPTER XI. 

Vioisti Galilaee 1 264 

Appendix A. Genealogical Table of the family of ConBtantius Chlorus 280 

Appendix B. Chronological Tables of Julian's life 281 

Appendix C. Synopsis of Literature upon Julian 231 



INTRODUCTION. 



R. E. 



INTKODUCTION. 



§ 1. Roman Religion. 

The birth of Christ sounded the knell of Paofanism. Though Inteobtjo- 

from distant and despised Judsea the wailing of the ban- .' 

shee was inaudible to Roman Paganism, at almost the same Homan 
time the ancient religion of Rome underwent a final revolu- ^'^^^^ 
tion. Old faiths had long been refluent. At the close of the 
Republic they were abandoned and replaced by new. The 
inauguration of the Empire of Rome synchronizes in some 
sort, and by no means accidentally, with an abdication of Em- 
pire by the old gods. Amid the varying types of Paganism, 
representing sometimes Greek eestheticism, sometimes Scy- 
thian savagery, sometimes Oriental sensuousness, sometimes 
Egyptian repose, it had been the pride of Roman Paganism 1. patri- 
to be above all else patriotic. Lacking the exuberant rich- ° ^'^ 
ness of Hellenic art and poetry, spurning alike the mystic 
piety and the voluptuous self-abandonment of the hot East, 
it strove with characteristic earnestness and consistency to 
be intensely national. Even before the Republic fell the 
power and the genius of the primitive religion died utterly 
out, Rome haughty, self-reliant, mistress of the world, 
needed no longer the aid of gods to win her victories ; the 
soul of Roman religion had evaporated, and the young 
Empire proclaimed its disappearance. Before imperialism 
and cosmopolitanism the very conception of patriotism had 
withered : it could not breathe or live in that atmosphere. 

Next after being patriotic Roman religion had been 2. moral. 
moral : it had personified (such was its one effort of imagi- 



4 



I^'TOOD^cnoN. 



ijrrBODTTc- nation) the moral virtues, and set these personified abstrac- 
TioN, i\qy^q iq superintend every sphere and occupation of life. 
But in an age of much superficial culture and still more 
of vast material civilisation, bringing with it luxury and 
enervation and their habitual concomitants ■widespread social 
and personal immorality, the homeliness and simplicity 
of the old faith had been abandoned. Faith, early cramped 
by the pedantry of a fatuous theology, had first degenerated 
into formalism, and then fallen an easy prey to rationalism, 
scepticism or all-pervading Hellenism. As a system of faith 
extinct, as an agent of morality powerless, as a lever of 
patriotism decayed, it was chiefly as a political mechanism 
that the ancient religion sur\'ived. Augur could not face 
augur without a smile, but neither was the worse augur for 
that. The old forms were of service still. They subsisted on 

- ' the strength of their weakness. They were too harmless to 

evoke opposition : they were too useful to invite abandon- 
ment. They answered their purpose sufficiently well, and to 
supply their place would have been tiresome. 

To the consolidation of Imperial government corresponded 
a consolidation, so to say, of State religion. We are as- 
tonished to find Augustus actually taking in hand a religious 
revival ; and emperor after emperor follows in his suit. 
Strange to say, when religion seemed most dead, there was a 
general restoration of temples, a new importance attached to 
worship and ceremonial, a higher regard for the sacred offices, 
a refreshed reverence paid to the Gods. This did not mean 
that the old faith was repossessing its lost dominion, but 
that a revolution in religion had occurred. Achieved facts 
received recognition, and religion was openly remodelled in 
accordance with their teaching. Imperial religion presents 
as necessary and violent a contrast to the religion of primi- 
tive Rome, as Imperialism itself to senatorial ' rule. Its sole 
unity was of a political character. The Emperor's power 
needed every support that it could find, and religion promised 
to be one of the most valuable. It was effective as a police 
agent; it could be conveniently turned to a moral purpose, 
where policy and morality went hand in hand ; and in a few 



Imperial- 
ism and 
Relifjious 
Revival. 



Nature 
of the 
Beviral 



INTRODUCTION. '-) 

cases its time-honoured prerogatives enabled it to discharge Inteobuc- 

as effectively and less offensively a censorship which required 1' 

something more than a statutory sanction. When the 
monarch became the fountain-head of law and authority, 
religion contributed its quota to his elevation. It was not 
enough that the Emperor should be Pontifex Maximus, the 
head of the religion; not enough that a lineal connexion 
should be established between the mythical Gods and the 
Imperial house ; the Emperor was made the object of 
religion as well. The deification of the Emperors proved a 
project as happy in result as it was audacious in conception. . 
It was no wonder that Emperors should foster religion which, 
more than anything else, conferred on them a prestige 
literally supernatural. In a manner, too, religion by this 
very step retained in a changed dress its old characteristic of 
nationality. Patriotism proper had of course died out ; cos- 
mopolitanism had transformed it into submission instead of 
self-sacrifice : loyalty to the State had become obedience to 
the Emperor. As patriotism has been the ruling element in 
the old religion, so in the new the key-stone of the whole 
was reverence clustering round the person of the Emperor. 

But the fossilisation of the old State religion, and its vir- ProHsion 
tual abandonment of all religious pretensions, could not kill the ous needs. 
relioious instinct. That remained active as ever, and needed 
to be provided for. This was done in the simplest and at 
the same time most comprehensive way, by giving it free 
scope. Eveiy trace of the old jealous exclusiveness was for- 
gotten. Just as the constitution of Home swelled from city to 
state and from state to world-embracing empire, so religion 
became as broadly cosmopolitan as the Empire itself. Hence- 
forth Eoman Paganism loses aU unity except that of political 
allegiance already described. Strictly speaking it does not 
admit of treatment as a single whole. It breaks into innu- 
merable forms of faith and worship, which alike by their 
complexity and independence defy analysis. But this multi- 
tudinous assemblage of creeds was constantly subjected to 
the action of various forces, intellectual, emotional, spiritual 
and mystical, the general drift of which can be roughly 



INTRODUCTION. 



iNinODUO- 
TION. 



measured and traced. This we will attempt to do, at least 
in the case of those which bore most directly on the state 
of things preceding the era of Julian. 



Stoicism. 



Its cha 
racter. 



§ 2. Philosophies Old and New. 

The intellectual currents of the time are mirrored in the 
fortunes of the more conspicuous schools of pliilosophy. 
Stoicism has first claim upon our attention. It produced its 
noblest representatives from a soil with so little outward 
promise as the Empire. Almost alone among the sages of 
antiquity, does Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Emperor, 
with Epictetus, the Roman slave, deserve the e^Dithet of 
'holy,' not unjustly accorded by Pagans to his colleague and 
father-in-law Antoninus. 

The influence of Stoicism was necessarily very partial : 
it was congenial only to the narrow circle of minds of a tone 
so pure and elevated and self-suflicing as to cherish virtue 
for the innate love and reverence they had for it. Through 
them it influenced others, but indirectly and imperfectly. For 
Stoicism, aiming at perfect airaOeia, and inculcating an ideal 
of unapproached severity, provided neither lever nor fulcrum 
to lift earth-bound souls to the ' toppling heights of duty ' 
set before them. On the religious side it never soared 
like Platonism, for its conception of religion was limited to 
Defects of duty and conduct. Neither transporting the emotions, nor 
kindling the imagination, it failed in effectiveness of appeal 
to the individual and unregenerate soul : it could not work 
conversions. Its thinly masked materialism, its pantheistic 
degradation of the deity, its dreary fatalism, all combined 
with its forbidding severity to narrow and restrict its influence. 
It was, and was found out to be, wanting. It imparted to 
the best of its disciples a profound undertone of sadness and 
desolation. True it nerved a Thrasea Paetus here and a 
Helvidius Priscus there, fired a Lucan or embittered a 
Persius, but it never, for good or for evil, so much as touched 
the common crowd. For them it was useless. It provided 
no personal God ; it ofFei'ed no explanation of pain or misery 



Stoicism. 



INTRODUCTION. 7 

or present evil ; it promised no release from sin, no mode of Intkoduo- 
sanctification ; it enunciated that he who offended in one ^i2f ' 
point was guiltj of all ; and yet in its entire annals it could 
not find^ one ideal wise man to satisfy the requirements of 
its law, and be the exemplar of them that came after : finally, 
it cut off hope in denying immortality^. For such defects not 
even its lofty universalism could atone. 

The first centuries of the Christian era show Stoicism Transfor- 
becoming forlornly conscious of its own inadequacy. It ^of^^°^g^1^ 
ceased either to originate or refute. Its constructive and 
scholastic age alike were past. Wearied with fruitless dis- 
putation, hopeless of a sound criterion of truth, baffled or 
else satisfied in its researches into nature, it elaborated no 
further its treatises on formal logic or metaphysics, abstained 
from multiplying or exploding new theories of physics, and 
devoted itself to ethics alone. Facere docet philosophia non 
dicere, 'Conduct not theory is the end of philosophy,' writes 
Seneca; while Musouius, in the same spirit, reduced philo- 
sophy to the simplest moral teachings. Even here it had no 
heart to argue longer, and refine upon the relations or inter- 
dependence of differing forms of virtue. In an age of flat 
unbelief and timorous superstition, of hopeless dissatisfaction 
and of passionate longing after securer truth, Stoicism despair- 
ingly conscious of universal and increasing degeneracy, fruit- 
lessly battling against sin within and without, ceased to 
teach didactically, and wearily addressed itself to preach its 
gospel of sad tidings, or sadly to commune with its own soul 
and be still. Its very sternness became strangely and wist- 
fully indulgent towards human frailty. Its great doctors Stole 
become homilists or devotional writers, throwing themselves ^' ^^'^ ""^' 
with vehemence or tenderness or importunate appeal upon 
the promptings of man's inner self, not endeavouring to con- 

1 In despair it sometimes cited Cato (Zeller, Stoics &c., p. 257 n.),,ox 
again Antoninus. Cf. Merivale, Boyle Lectures, p. 96. 

^ So at least earlier Stoics ; and so too, to the popular understanding at 
any rate, M. Aurelius; though the convergence of Stoicism towards 
Platonism, represented by Seneca, taught a future life with Purgatory and 
Elysium, and indeed a quasi-immortality. ZeUer, Stoics Epicureans and 
Sceptics, pp. 206—209. 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

Introduc- vince the intellect but to move the heart. In its old age 

' "°^ ' Stoicism fathomed new deeps in its vaunted " conformity to 

nature." 

Stoicism To Paganism Stoicism was not antagonistic. It did 

and Pa- indeed in its esoteric teachinsr scornfully reject the current 
gamsm, ° j j 

mythologies, and deny the efficacy of prayer or ceremonial 
worship, but even here, by virtue of free allegorizing of 
ancient myths, of faith in prophecy dreams and divination (to 
which a doctrine of predestination was made to lend some 
rational support), and of belief in Sai/iove? and guardian 
genii, the Stoic philosopher found various points of approxi- 
mation to the popular beliefs. In its exoteric utterances 
however it went far beyond this. In the supposed interests 
of morality Stoicism pertinaciously upheld existing modes of 
faith and worship, and strove to confirm by a religious sanc- 
tion individual conscientiousness and public virtue. Thus 
Marcus Aurelius, an Agnostic as regards his personal con- 
victions, was yet as Emperor careful to observe all ancestral 
religious rites : and this not from simple indifference or 
sheer hypocrisy. The Stoic Pantheist discerned in Polytheism 
the popular expression of his own more enlightened Pan- 
theism, and believed that the manifold Gods of the heathen 
were but partial, and, as it were, fractional representations 
of the unknown One, whom he had learned dimly to 
apprehend. 
Stoicism Towards Christianity, in so far as it differentiated that 

and Chris- religion from other cults. Stoicism felt very differently. 
When in the person of Antoninus Stoicism mounted the 
throne of the world, both from the vigorous suppression of 
malicious sycophants, and from the tolerance accorded to the 
most pronounced Scepticism, the Christians hoped much. 
But neither petitions nor complaints availed to justify their 
Marcus expectations. Under the just and gentle sway of Marcus 
Aurelius. Aurelius persecution waxed fiercer than before. Martyrdoms 
for the first time became numerous : torture apparently was 
now first employed to enforce apostasy. The records of the 
churches of Smyrna, of Lyons, of Autun, and of Vienne all 
testify the same tale. The ribald calumnies of detractors. 



INTRODUCTION. 9 

and the defiant taunts of Christian Apologists, may have Inteoduc- 
whetted the philosopher's dislike, but from the first Christi- ^^°^ ' 
anity must have roused his aversion rather than his sym- 
pathy. The stern Stoic could have little tenderness for these 
stubborn and rebellious nonconformists. In favour of their 
religion they could claim neither the ancestral sanction of 
Paganism, nor the prescriptive liberties of philosophic 
Scepticism. It was an impertinence for ignorant rustics and 
untaught artisans obstinately, contemptuously to spurn rites 
to which the cultivated philosopher yielded at least outward 
respect. Stoicism, in spirit if not in theory, was too exclu- 
sive and aristocratic- to suffer common folk to share that 
intellectual freedom, that elevated atheism, which was the 
monopoly of the initiated few. Of the inward purity and 
loftiness of Christian morality Stoicism knew nothing ; the 
inscrutable courage and resolution imparted by it was im- 
puted to sheer perversity^; while the irrepressible 8chwdr- 
merei of Christians, their enthusiasm and fanaticism, their 
infatuation and aggressiveness, their superstition and their 
bigotry, were as repulsive as they were unaccountable to 
the Stoic. 

Epicureanism — and a wide latitude may be accorded to Epicure- 
the term — deserves consideration next. In numbers, it dis- '^'"^"*- 
tanced Stoicism hopelessly : no philosophy was so popular; it 
seemed to many the only philosophy that could strictly be 
said to survive^. Intellectually however it was in stagnation. 
Throughout the Imperial epoch it produced not one exponent 
of first or even second-rate capacity. In his auction of phi- 
losophers Lucian lets Epicurus go for two minae : Sceptics 
and Cynics alone fetch a lower price. For many years before 
Julian's accession Epicureanism was the one historic school 
unrepresented amid the chairs of Athens University. The 
inspired intensity of its great poet-apostle had rapidly burnt 
out. Men cared as little for the Atomic Theory, as the Gods 
of Epicurus cared for men. Epicureans, like Stoics, aban- 
doned physics and metaphysics, and found no ethics worth 

^ Kara \j/(.\7]i' irapdra^iv, ws oj UpLariavoi. — M. Aurel. Medit. xi. 3. 
2 Bios. Laert. x. 9. 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

Inthoduo- teaching; dilettantes, with a thin veneer of spurious Hellenism, 
J^ anxiously flattering themselves that they lived after some 
theory, they enlisted under Epicureanism as giving the most 
comfortable account of this life and the most absolute assur- 
ance that there was no life to come. As tutors, rhetoricians, 
barristers and wits they leavened society. 
Epicnre- Epicureanism derived much amusement from attacks on 

inmm and ^j^g popular religion. It derided its superstitions, chuckled 
over its immoralities, and poked fun at its Gods. In the 
abandoned flippancy of its attacks it proves how completely 
religion had lost its hold on the upper classes of society. It 
did not attempt any semblance of reconstruction; for by the 
Epicurean the religious instinct was declared not to exist, 
and where created or inculcated to be bad and deserving of 
eradication alone. By exposing charlatanism, jeering at faith 
and ridiculing enthusiasm, he served partly to discredit, and 
still more to debase sinking Paganism. 
Epicure- Against Christianity Epicureanism felt no peculiar spite. 

C'/v]"<f-"'^ Christians were possibly more simple and gullible than other 
aiiity. denominations, but apart from that were well-meaning good- 
natured people, by no means adapted to make much stir in 
the world. 
Scepti- The Sceptic Philosophy proper was far too sterile and 

asm, negative to be widely influential under the Empire or at any 
other time. Still small coteries went on thrashing chaff and 
demonstrating doubt, the certainty and desirability of which 
Sextus Empiricus among others syllogised in formal tropes, 
with the solitary flaw that logical demonstration was by his 
own showing proved impossible. Of dogmatic theology, 
Pagan Hellenistic or Christian, they said as of other things, 
that God and belief in God were equally probable, equally 
true, and equally untrue as any other hypothesis. 
Nno Sys- Such is the unattractive spectacle presented by the old 

^"''^' philosophies. It is no marvel that efforts were made after 
new systems. From the inauguration of the Empire, and 
even earlier, Eclecticism — witness from very different sides 
Seneca and Lucian — was everywhere rampant. The new 
philosophies — if theosophies is not the more appropriate 



INTRODUCTION. 11 

appellation — were eclectic attempts to harmonise more intel- Introduc- 
ligently faith and reason. — ' 

Of these sects the Neo-Pythagoreans need very passing Neo-Py- 
mention; they endeavoured to reconcile polytheistic beliefs ^^^^°'"^"'^" 
and practices with the transcendental conception of a supreme 
Being too exalted to be honoured by sacrifices or named in 
words, and only to be dimly apprehended by pure reason as 
darkly prefigured or occultly manifested in the mystic symbols 
and numbers of Pythagoreanism. 

A kindred but less abortive attempt presents itself in Piatonism. 
revived Piatonism. The School of Plutarch, Apuleius, Galen, 
Celsus and Numenius flourished until merged in third- s 
century Neo-Platonism. Men of piety conjoined with culture, 
dissatisfied alike with vulgar superstitions and with current 
intellectual negations, they sought in the defaced traditions 
of antiquity a record of the primitive revelation vouchsafed 
to man. With this view national beliefs were reverently but 
closely scrutinised. The result was the recognition of a 
supreme eternal invisible God, pure and passionless, and also 
of the immortality of the soul, whose proper aim was moral 
assimilation to God. Subordinate to the supreme deity were 
ranged superhuman powers and activities, who controlled the 
forces of nature, and regulated the affairs of men. Beneath 
these again were unnumbered Sat/xoz^e?, peopling the universe 
and the intermundia, the authors of health and sickness, weal 
and woe : to them it was that prayers and sacrifices were 
offered, as the appointed mediators between God and man. 

The truth of religion in Plutarch's view was irrefragably Plutarch. 
proved by the testimony of antiquity, by the evidences of 
prophecy and oracles, by miracles of mercy and visitations 
of judgment, by the efiicacy of prayer and the revelations of 
the inner consciousness. He appealed alike to historical 
evidence and to individual experience. His sympathies were 
singularly wide : he gladly recognised the soul of goodness in 
the thousand creeds and formulas of Paganism, Amid all the 
characteristic diversities of development he pointed to the 
central and animating truth which they with more or less 
of faithfulness represented. By their aid he strove to recon- 



12 INTRODUCTION. 

Inthobuc- cilo the supernatural with the rational, disarming the infidel 
— 1' by the same argument with which he refuted superstition. 
" The true priest of Isis is he who, having been taught by 
law the rites and ceremonies that pertain unto the Gods, 
examines the same by reason and philosophises on the truth 
that they enshrined" These principles he faithfully applied 
to the fabric of existing religions. Omens, for instance, were 
defended by a theory of predestination, a kind of ordered or 
pre-arranged harmony whereby for the believer the signs 
were brought into correspondence with the event signified. 
The eccentricities and imperfections of prophecies and oracular 
verses, out of which scoffers made great capital, were ac- 
counted for by distinguishing between what has been called 
dynamic and mechanical inspiration. ' Not the language, 
nor the tone nor the expression nor the measure of the verse 
proceeds from the God ; — all this comes from the woman. 
God but supplies the intuition and kindles in the soul a light 
for that which is to come.' Similarly the rationale of prayer, 
that is the converse of man with God, was to be found in its 
subjective effect. Images could only be defended as repre- 
sentations and reminders of the invisible deities, and such 
indeed in their origin they were, until an idle superstition 
perverted them from symbols into actual gods. 

Thus there was at least one philosophy, which assailed 
the rationalism of Euhemerus and the atheistic materialism 
of Epicurus as sincerely and unsparingly as it denounced the 
credulity of superstition ; which recognised in infidelity the 
counterpart and twin brother of superstition ; and which 
endeavoured to enlist against both the higher promptings 
alike of reason and of conscience. But while philosophy 
timidly conserved old faiths, or despondently proffered bare 
negations, the religious instincts of men carved for themselves 
more convenient channels in which to flow. 

^ Plut. To priestess of Isis, c. iii. 



INTRODUCTION. 13 



§ 3. Hellenism and Mystery Worship. iNTEODtrc- 

Greek religion, originally derived from the East, had Hellenism. 
wholly changed the conceptions from which it took its origin. 
Repelled artistically by the grotesque ugliness of Phoenician 
religion both in its inward conceptions and outward repre- 
sentations, too full of joyfulness to bear with the cruelties of 
a Moloch worship or offerings of human blood, the Greek 
genius with a splendid imaginativeness recast the whole of 
its religion in an anthropomorphic mould. By a series of 
magnificent metamorphoses it repudiated a debased Fetichism, 
and substituted a graceful anthropolatry. As Egypt and the 
East were the home of sjmibol- worship, Greece was the 
nursery of myths. Such as they were, teeming with grace 
and beauty and gladness, yet as a religion destitute enough 
of moral elevation or depth of insight, Greek forms of belief 
attained a strong external and literary hold upon the people 
who professed them. 

From its defects as a religion hardly less than its merits ita adaft- 
as a mythology, Hellenism possessed unique power of adapta- " ^ * 2/- 
tion to the taste or instincts of foreign nations. Everywhere 
commended by the supreme intellectual ascendancy of the 
Greek mind, everywhere communicated by the conquests of 
Alexander, it eventually not only naturalised itself in the 
religion of E,ome, but spread from town to town throughout 
the East, from the shrine of Jupiter at Ammon or^ Venus at 
Dendera to the mouths of the Danube and Borysthenes, or the 
banks of the Indus and Jaxartes, until "^Wrjve^ became in 
the East the generic name for Pagans. Sometimes supplant- 
ing, sometimes transfiguring, sometimes combining Avith pre- 
existing faiths, Hellenism triumphed gloriously. But having 
neither moral depth nor historical foundation, it was as a 
religion helpless in battling against Scepticism. It yielded 
on the intellectual ground after strangely ineffective pretences 
at resistance, and fell back for influence and self-main- 
tenance on the innate richness of its mythology, the wealth 
of its literature, the products of its art, the beauty and joy- 



14 INTRODUCTION. 

Introdcc- ousncss of its cults. These were calculated to command 
!^' every admiration short of worship, from high and low to- 
gether. 
Mystery. The moral and religious element, which had disappeared 

on up. fiom Roman and had scarcely found a place in Greek reli- 
gion, was supplied by the mysticism of the East. The 
irreligious religion of Greece had been from the first sup- 
plemented by various forms of mystery-worship, and the 
more as its failure to meet the religious instinct of men 
Tts rela- became increasingly apparent. The Greeks, we have seen, 
^Grelk^^^^ reconstructed their mother religions on an anthropomorphic 
religion, basis ; pretty and captivating as was the result, it necessarily 
fell, so far as its truth was concerned, before the advances of 
philosophy and science, though the beauty of the design 
secured it to the last wide popularity alike from the literary 
side and from that of external observance. But the spiritual 
side having fallen into abeyance, the parent religion began 
forthwith either Kronos-like to devour its own offspring, or 
else harmoniously to adopt it as partner of the same hearth 
With and home. Roman religion, on the other hand, with its 
reUcdon deeply religious sense, forbade all mystery-worship, and for 
long successfully kept it at bay : as Roman faith failed, and 
became enfeebled in moral aspiration and ideals, various 
forms of mysteries began to intrude. Full license was not 
accorded, until the public renunciation of national faith was 
formally announced in the deification of the Emperors, and 
the public advertisement given that the old gods were de- 
funct. Plain folk could no longer believe in state Gods, when 
asked to recognise in the person of Cassar a God, a priest, an 
atheist all in one. The declaration of atheism was so ex- 
plicit, that gods had to be sought elsewhere. 
Grototh At a time when the oracles were wholly dumb, and faith 

"hnof"'^' burned very low, when men looked fondly back to 'the dear 
mystery- dead light' of at least a sincere Paganism, when they saw the 
dishonoured corpse of the old faith, for all its splendid 
trappings, simply the mark of ridicule and insult, when poor 
souls all the world over, utterly to seek for a Saviour or an 
exemplar or a divine voice of guidance, groped in darkness, 



INTRODUCTION. 15 

what wonder that at such a time mystery-worship grew Inteodtjc- 

rampant ? The mysteries of Mithras, Isis, and Serapis, the ' 

strange rites of Tauroholia and Krioholia with their mystic 
interment of the neophyte and baptism of blood, professed at 
least to unveil the secrets of the hidden world, and supply a 
link between the unseen and the seen. Reinterpreting the 
ancient myths probably in a pantheistic sense, they at least 
averred that the world was not wholly forsaken of God, and 
in symbolic deed and word set forth the hope of immortality. 
In some particulars they furnish a strange and hardly 
accidental parody of the most sacred mysteries of Chris- 
tianity. Not only was a long and painful preliminary train- 
ing required of the catechumens of Mithras, the initiation of 
water, of fire, of fasting, and of penance, whereby as in the 
Christian Church the initiated {reXecoL) might become first 
hearers, then worshippers, then illuminated or elect, and so 
pass into the body corporate of those admitted to the full 
esoteric revelation, but there were more direct imitations of 
Christian rites. There was baptism for the purification of 
sins, the unction of holy oil for the sanctification of life, and 
the oblation of bread and wine to serve as the bond of 
brotherhood. 

But coupled with these rites were baser forms of worship. Its immo- 
pandering to curious and diseased superstition. Magic, ''*"*2/- 
miraculous phenomena, invocation of the dead, visible appari- 
tions of spiritual powers, were the unfailing accompaniment 
of all modes of mystery-worship. These brought in their 
train not only soothsaying and magic, demonolatry and necro- 
mancy, and all the arts called black, but came with their plague 
of lice as well as their plague of darkness : lewd and abomin- 
able rites, foul phallic emblems were employed to stimulate 
and satisfy the cravings of diseased minds. Thus shamefully 
prostituting the higher mission that they undertook, they at 
once degraded the intellect and polluted the soul. 



IC INTRODUCTION. 



iNTBODtJc- § 4. Christianity. 

TION, 

p.^ — : Amid the fatigue of old faiths and philosophies, the 

chrisii- tcdious travail of new systems, and the invasion of pernicious 
"'" ^' superstitions, one only, faith philosophy or superstition, 
pressed steadily forward. Confounded at first with Judaism, 
Christianity soon shook itself free, and set out on its career of 
progress. It shunned publicity; it -did not court the notice of 
the educated or the powerful ; yet at the opening of the second 
century, even high officials became aware that there was 'a 
new superstition' abroad in the world; so novel indeed in 
kind, so strangely inoffensive and staid, so suspiciously loving 
and worshipful, as to call for the wisdom of an emperor^ fitly 
to discountenance it. Its devotees were pronounced so far 
unblameable as to deserve punishment only when prosecuted, 
not inquisition for prosecution's sake. The next emperor'^ 
'^ has ascended the throne, and Christianity is found to have 
made a new step in advance. The new religion is infecting 
the wise as well as the foolish; is adopting a philosophic 
guise, is entering the field of literature, and pressing for at 
least a fair hearing of its claims. Christianity denounced as 
atheistic, as revolutionary, as immoral, busily refutes these 
charges. It is the age of the Apologists. Gradually it aban- 
dons defence; the calumnies have become too stupid and flat to 
deserve reply; and Christian writers are engaged in co-ordi- 
nating Christian truth and doctrine with the lore of philoso- 
phers and the varied wisdom of the past. Christianity 
is in contact with the court; bishops are presented; Christian 
teachers are in correspondence with the Imperial family; nay, 
the Emperor himself is suspected of leanings towards the 
religion^. A very few years more, and Christianity is a 
recognised^ cult existing under Imperial sanction and legal 
protection. The rulers^ of the Church have become influential 
potentates, with whom it is no condescension for courts to 

1 Sc. Trajan. ^ Hadrian. 

3 Cf. Origen's correspondence with Mammaca; with the Emperor PhUip, 
his wife and mother. 

* Edict of Galhcnus. ' E.g. Paul of SamoBata. 



INTRODUCTION. 17 

intrigue. Not many years later we find the principal places Introduc- 
in court about the Imperial person filled by Christians, amid "°^ ' 
whom are numbered the Emperor's wife and sister, and from 
whose ranks the shrewd Diocletian selects his own most 
confidential servants. Even numerically, Christianity at the 
accession of Constantino was the professed religion of a tithe 
of the inhabitants of the Empire. 

Such in most rapid outline was its external progress: let 
us examine its relations to current religion, to society and to 
the State. 

Paganism in its later stages has no more characteristic Ghristi- 
feature than the carelessness and prodigality of its poly- ^PaZ,nism 
theism. The spirit of cosmopolitanism, inaugurated by Pagan 
Caesar and consummated in the Edict of Caracalla, affected tmism 
religion no less than all other parts of thought and life. 
Free-trade in religion was alike a recognised theory and an 
accomplished fact. It was a quite antiquated proceeding to 
chain the guardian gods to the walls of the beleaguered city. 
Greek enterprise conveyed with it the national gods to 
favour the disposition of its wares, and in return transported 
home the deities of the countries where it dealt. At the 
great centres of commerce, Alexandria, Antioch, and the like, 
there lived side by side the strangest medley of heterogeneous 
gods: — gods of all origins, gods of all shapes and sizes, gods 
of all sexes and colours, found equal honour or dishonour 
from crowds of speculative worshippers. Athens, the city of 
temples, for fear of forgetting some one, reared altars to the 
unknown gods. Rome solved the same problem by build- 
ing the Pantheon. Such was the religious universalism of 
the day. The rival religions, prompted whether by generosity 
or indifferentism or the shrewdness of self-interest, conspired 
as a rule to favour and abet each other. One only excited Paganism 
universal opposition. Priests and false prophets at least, if ^^^™gl 
none other, recognised the radical antagonism of Christianity Christi- 
to their pretensions. 'If there is any atheist, Christian or '^ * ^' 
Epicurean here present, let him be cast out\' 'No Christian 
admitted' was on the door of their sanctuaries. 
1 Lucian Alex. § 38. 

R. E. 2 



18 INTRODUCTJON. 

ixTRODuo- Such was the obvious attitude for Pagan Clergy towards 

■ the new religion. To which side did public opinion incline? 

^''7 '*' d Unpoj)ularity beyond a doubt was one of the trials which 

rubiic the early Christians were called to face. Again and again 

pinion. j.jjgy -^gi-e the first victims of any general dissatisfaction. 

Vnpopu- •' JO 

laritij of Not merely does Nero select them as the most agreeable 
anity!^' sacrifices to popular rage; but if there was a plague, or an 
earthquake, an eruption or an eclipse, a famine or a fire, if 
the Tiber overflowed its banks or the Nile did not, the 
populace cried out, ' The Christians to the lions.' The 
jealousies of Pagan priests and mystagogues, the imperilled 
interests of certain classes of artisans and employes account 
in part for this : but still more the character and effect of the 
religion itself. Atheism was a charge no less natural than 
damaging. The fanaticism, eccentricity and apparent mo- 
roseuess of Christians made fatally against them. The ex- 
travagance of individuals, for instance as criminals at the 
bar or as soldiers called on to take the military oath, 
discredited their faith: and dark charges of nightly license 
and strange sorceries of blood easily fanned prejudice into 
persecution. It was little by little and very slowly that the 
sterling virtue of Christians disarmed calumny and enforced 
respect. It cannot be safely said that before the time of 
Diocletian Christianity had ceased to be unpopular. But 
one among other things proved by his persecution is its 
strength in the affections of the people. 
Christian- The treatment of Christianity by the State is quite 
ity and the another question. Religious persecution was an idea alto- 
gether alien to the genius of the Roman Empire, Incidentally, 
to be sure, to suppress patriotism or bridle some dangerous 
and ruling hierarchy, it might become necessary; but such 
persecution was political not religious. Rational polytheism 
naturally if not necessarily assumes the validity of other forms 
of belief. The State did not profess any exclusive religious 
belief : the gods of each newly-conquered nation were duly 
catalogued without remonstrance among divinities: Olympus 
was open to all comers without competitive examination. 
Nay, it did not profess even a particular cult. In the solemn 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

religious festival preceding the Marcomannic War Marcus iNTEODnc- 
Aurelius sent for priests from all quarters and of all cults, "°^ ' 
that all the gods might go with his arms. Rome attributed 
half her success to her impartial treatment of all deities. 
Universal Empire was the due guerdon of universalism in 
religion. The persecutions of Nero and Domitian sprang it Persecu- 
would seem out of mere caprice and malice. These excepted, plfo^s ^'^' 
it is those emperors who first descried the social and political 
powers and perils latent in Christianity, in other words the 
wisest and the most far-sighted, a Trajan, a Hadrian, or a 
Marcus Aurelius, who head the roll of reasoning consistent 
persecutors. The commonest test imposed on recusant Chris- 
tians was the essentially political, though nominally religious 
test' of sacrifice to the genius of the Emperor. Persecution Gradual 
naturally enous^h grows more violent and more systematic in ysrava- 

. . . . .... ^^"'^ ojper- 

proportion as the politico-social power of Christianity is secution. 

gradually realised. When Christianity was a provincial and 
plebeian affair, Trajan's gentle and limited persecution 
rescript is put forward as a remedy for local troubles and 
disaffections. Hadrian's edict bears the same impress : it is 
a salutary, if painful antidote, to relieve the pressure of local 
pain. Antoninus Pius explicitly ordains that Christians are 
to be punished when convicted of political crimes; while 
whoever accused them on the score of religion was liable to 
prosecution. In Marcus Aurelius there is more of settled 
dislike and consistent suppression. We are informed, he 
writes, that the laws are violated by those called Christians ; 
let them be arrested and punished with divers tortures. The 
Church was rapidly consolidating its internal government, and 
daily becoming a more formidable social power. The next 
real epoch in persecution is that, when 'after long years the 
accursed monster arose, Decius, to vex the Church.' Govern- 
ment being awake or at least waking to the sense that 
Christianity was a world-wide force, persecution ceases to be 
local and is made general. The spasmodic fears of Decius 
become the settled policy of Valerian. For the first time an 
Emperor realised the full extent of the problem, foresaw that 
Christianity must either triumph or die. Sternly and thought- 

2—2 



20 INTRODUCTION. 

Introdtjc- fully lie grappled Avith it. For the time the attack was foiled. 
— ■ It was renewed in almost precisely the same form, when 
forty years later the great tenth wave of persecution swept 
with overwhelming violence upon the devoted Church. 
Strength But the Diocletianic persecution proved that the Church 

^JJ^l'^1 need no longer plead for sufferance from the secular power, 
Church, but could face it as an equal and make terms in virtue of its 
own strength. By that time the Christians had become not 
merely the Emperor's trustiest servants: they were also the 
backbone of the State. In the army entire legions were 
composed of Christians, in the great towns whole quarters 
were occupied by them. The time was gone by when they 
declined military service or official functions. From their 
numbers were recruited the most enterprising artisans, the 
most regular tax-payers, and the strength of the proletariate. 
The old Empire was growing decrepit: it was not yet bed- 
ridden, yet had small strength longer to walk abroad: it 
could but just totter about its own domains and warn off 
intruders. It could not long hold out against increasing 
physical inanition: the steady decrease of population alone 
threatened it with rapid mortification. Few now married : 
still fewer produced offspring; and of offspring produced an 
abnormally large percentage perished in infancy. Physically 
as well as morally the best hope of the Empire lay in the 
Christians. For the successors of Diocletian the sole alter- 
native was dull protracted civil war or unification of Church 
and State. Constantine's choice and execution of the wiser 
course constitutes his claim to greatness. 



§ 5. Conclusion. 

It is worth while in conclusion to gather into one focus 

the results obtained., and to summarise the state of affairs at 

the accession of Constantino. 

Paganism The simpler, more unsophisticated Paganism of earlier 

doomed. ^^^^ jg manifestly doomed. It might still indeed be seen 

sitting in its tomb like Charlemagne, clothed with insignia 



INTSODUCTION. 21 

of pomp and the sceptre of power, but void r.ow of the living Inteoduc- 
soiil that had given to those outward emblems all their i_" 
significance. Greek Philosophy as a decomposing agent had 
signally succeeded : as a constructive power it had no less 
signally failed. It had finally degenerated into stale moralis- 
ing. To the rescue of prevalent unbelief various forces had 
stepped forward — most conspicuously, mystery-worship and 
revived Platonism. The former appealed most effectively to 
the lov>rer instincts, the latter lacked the historical founda- 
tions which it required and assumed. The world lay in 
ruins ; current creeds and philosophies were like convicts 
piling and repiling heaps of waste shot. Probably nine out 
of ten educated men regarded faith as a thing of the past, 
scepticism as mistress of the future. 

Yet signs of a very different kind were not wanting. Vitality 
Though the forms of religion had broken away, the spirit oi^gUqious 
religion was still quick ; it had even developed : the sense of Sense. 
sin, an almost new phenomenon, began to invade Society 
and philosophy ; and along with this, an almost importunate 
craving after a revelation. The changed tone of philosophy, 
the spread of mysticism, the rapid growth of mystery-worship, 
the revived Platonism, are all articulate expressions of this 
need. The old Philosophy begins not only to preach but to 
pray : the new strives to catch the revealed voice of God in 
the oracles of less unfaithful days\ If any religion was 
destined to prevail amid the downfall of all creeds and 
mysteries, it had become manifest that that religion was cimsti- 
Christianity. The precise numerical strength of the Church *"**^- 
is comparatively unimportant. Whether a fifth or a twentieth 
of Rome's subjects, the minority was formidable from its 
nature not its numbers. It was with the Church as with her 
martyrs. Be they counted by hundreds or by thousands, 
their blood was in either case the seed of the Church. It 
was a new and astounding phenomenon that a religion had 
come into the world capable of producing martyrs at all. 
Of what other religion could it be said that its devotees 
'were only too ready to die'? In the teeth of an organised 

1 Porphyry's Collection of Ancient Oracles. 



22 INTEODUCTION. 

Introduc- and concentrated despotism a new society had grown up, self- 

1" supporting, self-regulated, self-governed, a State within the 

State. Calm and assured amid a world that hid its fears 
only in blind excitement, free araid the servile, sanguine amid 
the despairing. Christians lived with an object. United in 
loyal fellowship by sacred pledges more binding than the 
sacramentum of the soldier, welded together by a stringent 
discipline, led by trained and tried commanders, the Church 
had succeeded in attaining unity. It had proved itself able 
to command self-devotion even to the death. It had not 
feared to assimilate the choicest fruits of the choicest intel- 
lects of East and West. The main danger lay in the decom- 
posing forces that threatened it from within. Yet it bid fair 
to triumph over these. It would hardly have to battle with 
a temper more impetuous and strong than Tertullian, an 
intellect more commanding and subtle than Origen : yet the 
centripetal forces were stronger ; Tertullian had died an 
heresiarch, and Origen but narrowly and somewhat of grace 
escaped a like fate. If rent with schisms and threatened 
with disintegration, the Church was still an undivided 
whole. 



THE EMPEEOR JULIAN 
PAGANISM AND CHPISTIANITY. 



CHAPTEK I. 

EELIGIOUS POLICY OF CONSTANTINE AND CONSTANTIUS. 



With the triumph of Constantine over Maxentius Chris- Gonstan- 
tianity entered on a new stage. The Edict of Milan was the ugious 
formal rehabilitation of Christians in their rights as citizens. Policy. 
The favour extended to them was in the first instance poli- 
tical rather than religious : but little by little, partly of 
policy, partly of superstition, partly of sincere conviction, 
Constantine, while adhering to a policy of religious tolera- 
tion, rendered more and more unequivocal adhesion to 
Christianity. The vague Deism with which he commenced 
proved untenable in the heat of the strife between the old 
faith and the new. A colourless tolerance was ipso facto im- 
possible as a permanence, however wise and natural a step- 
ping-stone to the era to come. Each accession of power 
made it more imperative upon him ' to make up his mind on 
the choice of a God\' A hundred years previously it had 
appeared to a Tertullian inconceivable, either that an em- 
peror should be a Christian, or a Christian be made emperor. 
Now with no very obvious wrench either to the state or the 
individual the momentous change was effected, the incre- 
dible achieved. Changed religion indeed, as Constantine 
himself declared^, could not but produce changed government. 
But the general policy of toleration, the sole policy possible 
for a statesman of Constantino's political tact, was not aban- 

1 Eus. Vit. Const, i. 27. 

^ Ej). ad Ariwn in Eus. Vit. Const, ii. 65. 



26 CONSTANTINE. • 

doned. In much of the empire, eminently at Rome ' itself, 
Pagan society was too strong, too aristocratic, too influen- 
tial to be defied with impunity, and a policy of open per- 
secution would have been plain suicide. But the effect of 
the open patronage of Christianity by the Court and the 
active discouragement of Paganism was enormous. 
External ^^ externals Christianity went forward with rapid strides. 

Progress of Proselytes poured in on all sides. * In town and country alike 
anity. might be seen nothing but new converts breaking their idols 
of their own accord ^.' Churches sprang up in all directions 
with architecture of a new magnificence. Vying with pa- 
laces in splendour, they were fitly called basilicas. The 
clergy increased yet faster than the laity. Of bishops there 
were nigh 2000. The Churches of Carthage and Constan- 
tinople each counted its 500 priests : it became necessary actu- 
ally to limit by law the numbers of the clergy : of the lower 
orders, deacons and readers, acolytes and exorcists, singers 
and doorkeepers, there was proportionate abundance ; while 
armies of paid agents, 2^ct'>'cibolani and copiatae, visited the 
sick or buried the dead. Hermits and anchorites, celibates 
and virgins, monks and sisterhoods, swarmed by thousands 
in the land. Nor is this surprising when we read of the rich 
endowments in territory or cash given to special churches ; 
of ofiicial promotion of Christians ; of privileges and exemp- 
tions accorded to clergy ; immunities from taxation reserved 
for Christian citizens ; presents of clothes or money awarded 
to converts ; subsidies granted to poor churches from the 
fiscal revenue ; relief funds distributed among the poor. Be- 
sides these substantial aids the whole weight and prestige of 
Court favour was freely thrown into the scale of Christianity. 
The Emperor entertained bishops, discoursed doctrine, con- 
futed heresy, presided at councils. Fashion and advance- 
ment both followed in the wake of the new religion. 

The internal effects on Christianity produced by the new 

1 Beugnot goes so far as to suppose that Constautine's fear of the 
ascendant Paganism of Eome was one motive for the transfer of his capital 
to Constantinople. 

^ Eus. Vit. Const, ii. 18. 



RELIGIOUS POLICY. 27 

relations in ■whicli it stood to tlie State, present less bright internal 
an aspect. It was unqualified gain that Christianity should be ^^*4i{- 
able to temper the savage traditions of Roman law, abolishing anity. 
the barbarous practices of branding and crucifixion, facilita- 
ting the manumission of slaves, and imposing penalties upon 
infanticide, rape, and fornication. But the Church did not 
stop here : Constantine's reign furnishes the earliest prece- 
dent for the infliction of spiritual punishments on civil of- 
fences, and conversely spiritual offences are now first chastised 
as such by the arm of law. The dragon's teeth are sown which 
sprang up armed, whether as the Inquisition or as Ultra- 
montanism. And this was but the least part of the general 
demoralisation of spiritual life, which invaded the Church 
at large, and which found a very partial and in some respects 
injurious remedy in the great ascetic and monastic reaction 
which it largely contributed to excite. 

A sudden outburst of heresy is another symptom which increase of 
followed the advent of the Church to power. Schisms ^^''^*2/- 
gained all at once a new vitality, and began to flourish 
with tropical rankness and luxuriance. Donatists and 
Circumcellions in the South, Arians in the East, made 
havoc of the peace of the Church. The history of Arian- 
ism attests how ineffectual a salve for the sore councils 
proved. This new prominence of heresy is directly due to 
the changed relations of Church and State. Partly the Church 
assimilated foreign and impure elements : partly the civil 
power was placed from the outset in a false position. 
The Emperor should never have been permitted, far less 
invited to preside at councils, to administer church disci- 
pline, to decide on questions of doctrine, to deal out chas- 
tisement or leniency to heretics. The Donatist troubles 
which so vexed Africa flowed directly from Constantine's 
hesitation and embarrassment. Arianism but for imperial 
vacillation might have died with its author. Nursed by 
Constantine's unwisdom, it became the war-cry of an ambi- 
tious talented faction, who crippled Christianity, stifled true 
religion, well-nigh extirpated orthodoxy, and who have been 
the means of ousting the faith of Christ for more than a 



28 CONSTANTINE. 

thousand years from the greatest of the old-world continents. 
Probably no keener disappointment ever befel Constantino 
than that of which he was thus the immediate source. He had 
hoped and, as it would seem, expected to find in Christianity 
that principle of unity which might reintegrate the divisions 
of the Empire. It was this hope perhaps which chiefly led 
him in the first instance to adopt the Christian faith : he 
was persuaded — it is his own confession^ — that could he be 
fortunate enough to bring all men to the worship of the 
same God, this change would produce another such in the 
government of State. To his intense chagrin, he found that 
far from resolving all discords and reuniting jarring interests 
of State, the Church proved incapable of keeping peace 
within its own borders. The most troublesome of seditions 
was that kindled and fanned by a Church feud. 
Paganism When Christianity became the avowed religion of the 
stantine. State, naturally enough Paganism, if not forcibly suppressed, 
was openly discountenanced. Constantino, in the first flush 
of triumph, seems to have expressly prohibited the old reli- 
gion, and made the exercise of pagan rites a penal offence. 
He hoped perhaps by a bold stroke to give the finishing blow 
to tottering Paganism. Meeting with unexpected resistance, 
and saved by Christian advisers or by his own political tact 
from proceeding to open persecution, he yet discouraged the 
old religions in the most unmistakeable way. The subsidies 
and exemptions accorded to Christians were practically fines 
and disabilities imposed on Pagans. And more direct dis- 
couragements were not wanting. The Emperor would not 
suffer his portrait to appear in Pagan temples : Pagan festi- 
vals were neglected, or adapted^ to Christian cults : Pagan 
shrines were by special writ left incomplete : many were dis- 
mantled of their most precious ornaments, more were suf- 

1 Ep. ad Arium in Eus. Vit. Const, ii. 65. 

^ This principle of adaptation was widely carried out, or sometimes baldly 
enough, e.g. the old procession to Serapis was retained, with the solemn 
deportation of the irrixoi tov 'NeiXov and other emblems ; its goal alone was 
altered, and became the Church, in place of the temple of the God, Soz. 5. 3. 
3, On the widespread paganisation of Christianity cf. Draper, Conflict 
between Religion and Science, p. 4fi, and Intell. Devcl. of Europe. Ch. x. 



RELIGIOUS POLICY. 29 

fered to fall into disrepair : not a few, where licentious rites 
were practised, were openly suppressed. The sign of the 
Cross supplanted the emblems of the gods. Sunday by Sun- 
day, while Christian soldiers attended divine service, their 
comrades paraded in camp to recite with military precision 
a prayer to^the one true God. So far as Paganism pos- 
sessed inward devotional life and spirit, its disaster was even 
more complete. Not only did Constantine, while retaining 
the title of Pontifex Maximus and submitting probably to the 
ceremony of a formal installation, systematically neglect the 
religious functions of the office, but beyond this the blow was 
more directly fatal. The Emperor, it must be remembered, 
was the chief deity of Paganism ; his worship almost the 
sole common link which bound together its endless deno- 
minations. For the Emperor to avow himself a Christian 
was for God to descend from his own altar and proclaim his 
apostasy. The small practical effect produced by so stu- 
pendous a catastrophe, proves merely how inconceivably 
little of sincere faith in its OAvn creed remained to Paganism. 

Such was the general tenour of Constantine's endeavours Constan- 
after religious unity. But local conditions stepped in to ugious 
modify the execution of this general policy. In the East, PoUctj. 
where Christianity had widest hold, Paganism succumbed, to 
the verge in many places of complete disappearance. In 
Constantinople, par excellence the Christian city of the em- 
pire, no heathen rite, nor altar, nor temple, was to be seen. 
In the West, on the other hand, pre-eminently at Rome, the 
central asylum or shrine of Polytheism, the old ceremonial 
remained untouched. There temples were restored : the 
Emperor was still sovereign Pontifex ; augurs and flamens 
and vestal virgins retained their old privileges ; the har^us- 
pices officially reported the significance of thunderbolts ; 
' JDii te nobis servent' was the recognised military salute; 
coins still wore their pagan emblems ; the Emperor himself 
remained 'divine,' the consort of Jupiter or Mars, of the 
unconquerable Sun or the Genius of Rome. The Divine 
Institutions of Lactantius survive to show with how living a 
spell Paganism still held in bondage the minds of men. 



30 CONSTANTIUS. 

Comtnn- The death of Constantine overlaps by six years the birth 

F^Manilm. ^^ Ji-ihan. The first great poUtical event Avhich the future 
Apostate could remember was doubtless the death of his 
Sfrandfather and the accession of Constantius. The new em- 
peror's policy towards Paganism hovered between reluctant 
tolerance and legalised persecution. He inaugurated^ his 
reign with a decree of persecution, suggested or approved 
by his Christian councillors. All superstitious worship was 
suppressed, and Pagan sacrifices expressly interdicted : 
though in favoured localities at any rate temples were suf- 
fered to stand as interesting monuments of antiquity, or as 
useful for the celebration of public games or ceremonies. 
That during the earlier part of his reign the edict was not 
literally carried out, may be considered certain. During the 
troubles with Magnentius, it was practically a dead letter, 
to judge by the edict issued almost immediately after the pre- 
tender's fall, prohibiting heathen nocturnal rites atEome^; but 
no sooner did Constantius find himself in 353 A.D. securely 
seated on the throne of empire, than he reinforced his earlier 
enactments by a decree^ commanding under heavy penalties 
the summary closing of all Pagan temples. A yet more 
stringent edict* in 356 made participation in idol-worship or 
sacrifice a capital offence; increasing crimes and tyranny 
produced a corresponding increase of suspicious fears, and 
the next eighteen months produced three decrees ^ for the 
legal infliction of the most horrible tortures, the rack and the 
hot iron, on all persons in connexion with the court who 
dared to take part in magic rites. But here again Con- 
stantius did not consistently carry out the policy prescribed 
on paper. At Rome he himself respected the privileges of 
the vestal virgins \ as Pontifex Maximus distributed coveted 
sacerdotal offices among the patricians, and investigated with 



1 A.D. 341. ^ Theod. Cod. xvi. x. 5. 

3 The actual publication of this law (Cod. Just. i. xi. 1) has been disputed, 
but on hardly sufficient grounds. Cf. Beugnot, p. 138 : against him 
Chastel, p. 78. 

* Cod. Theod. xvi. x. 6. ^ Ibid. ix. xvi. 4—6. 

6 Symmachus, Ejpp. x. liv. 7. 



RELIGIOUS POLICY. 31 

interest the origin and story of the more famous temples'; 
And this on the full tide of ascendant fortune ! At Eome 
society remained Pagan, and the aristocracy sturdily declined 
to sue royal favour at the expense of religious apostasy. The 
loss of caste involved would have been but poorly counter- 
balanced by court smiles and official patronage bestowed in 
compensation on the renegade. Without dissimulation or 
check, patricians, prefects, consuls and municipal magistrates 
of Rome wore the garb, retained the titles ^ and did the 
honours of the old cult with unabated zeal. Nor was Rome 
a solitary exception : at Alexandria too heathen worship .- 
was maintained in almost its ancient splendour. From this 
conflicting evidence, this stringency of letter combined with 
laxity of practice, the fair inference is that the law was never 
dangerously pressed, but onl}'- politicly employed, where 
circumstances permitted. It was the sheathed sword that 
could be drawn at pleasure ; and it was in the East that 
it found most scope for action. In the West, whatever 
may have been the theory, in practice the Imperial policy 
amounted to almost complete religious toleration^. 

Constantius during his closing years lapsed gradually m policy 

into a sort of political dotage : he became the tool of hypo- °-^ ^''?*' 

. . . , . "^ ^ titantius. 

critical and designing courtiers ; he grew less, not more tole- 
rant ; he multiplied the demoralising exemptions accorded 
to Christians ; he fostered still more effectually Church dis- 
putes ; he intruded more audaciously into theological contro- 
versies ; he pitched his pretensions not short of infallibility ; 
he surrounded himself more closely with, and left himself more 



1 Beugnot, p. 161 ff., quotes numerous inscriptions in support of this 
position. 

2 Beugnot considers Constantius' ^professed policy to have been one of 
toleration; but in face of the laws above referred to, of the non-publication 
of which there is no satisfactory evidence, this cannot be maintained: in 
any case they would appear to represent the views of Constantius, even if 
these were not actually carried into effect : (cf. De Broglie, iii. 364 n.). He 
also makes far too light of the evidence for actual spoliation and destruction 
of temples. The fact does not rest merely on rhetorical tropes of Libanius, 
but is incidentally supported by numerous occurrences of Julian's reigu. 
Cf. Schrockh EirchengescMchte, vi. pp. 8 — 11. 



32 CONSTANTIUS. 

completely than his father at the mercy of despicable favour- 
ites. 'With his chamberlain' (the notorious Eusebius), 
writes AmmianS 'he possessed considerable influence:' he 
armed himself with spies innumerable : the ' Curiosi ' be- 
Constan- came a regular department of State, Avith fixed salaries and 

tius' Coun- an official name. It is difficult to credit the numbers of 
cillors. 

those who, as dependents in the palace or as officials in 

the provinces, sucked the blood of the exhausted State. The 
eunuch, that parasite of Eastern despotism, was re-imported'^ 
to the West, to serve in the bedchamber, to sit at the table, 
to whisper in the ear, and to guide the councils of the Em- 
peror. Constantius j)romoted to special honour this crew, of 
whom Christian and Pagan writers speak with the same 
contemptuous hate, these ' lizards and toads, creatures may 
be of the spring, but all unclean.' Men of learning found 
no place at Court. His councillors, Christians in name, were 
many of them bishops, but all or almost all made religion a 
mere stepping-stone to self-advancement. 

Christian The Church was in the most indescribable confusion. 

Anarchy. From the time when the Council of Nicaea had delivered 
the final verdict of Christianity on the Arian heresy, Arians 
had ceased to be honest if misguided heretics, and had con- 
verted themselves into a turbulent political faction. At each 
episcopal election or expulsion the most exalted sees of 
Christendom, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, furnished 
scenes that would have disgraced a revolution'': venerable 
confessors * were tortured into heresy upon the rack : ortho- 
dox prelates or clergy were exiled, starved, strangled, or be- 
headed^ The great Christian commonwealth seemed drift- 
ing into helpless anarchy. Bishops had become so many 
centres of confusion and ringleaders of heresy, who could 

1 Apud quern — si vere dici debeat — multa Constantius pofcuit. — Amm. M. 
xviii. iv. 3. His favourites and officials were also all Christians, not, like 
Constantine's, of mixed creeds. 

^ Constantine's wisdom had discouraged what Diocletian's pride had in- 
troduced. Gibbon, c. xix., is admii'ably terse upon this subject. 

^ Cf. esp. the history of Bps. Macedonius, Gregory and George. 

* e.g. Hosius of Cordova. 

5 Cf . among many Lucius Bp. of Hadrianople, Paul of Constantinople, and 
Liberius of Eome. 



RELIGIOUS POLICY. 83 

publicly inaugurate their reign with ribald blasphemies^. 
Arians in the East, or Sabellians ^ in the West, they met in 
council and counter-council to frame new creeds, or fulmi- 
nate anathemas^. To and fro they galloped to this synod 
and to that, till the public posting service (at whose 
expense they travelled) threatened to succumb. Arians, semi- 
Arians, and Acacians found councils an unrivalled organisa- 
tion for mischief ; Homoean, or even Anomoean creeds, were 
put forth with reckless prodigality. From the time that 
Constantius became sole emperor, though the number of 
councils keeps pace with the number of years, not one sup- 
ported orthodox Christianity. Constantius lived to see the 
work of subversion crowned with success, and orthodoxy vir- 
tually non-extant. He lived to see Athanasius a fugitive 
with a price upon his head, and to witness the Council of 
Ariminum at which, in the words of Jerome, 'the whole 
world groaned amazed to find itself Arian *.' The fatal Constan- 
results of the policy adopted in Constantine's reign were ^chrhtian 
making themselves manifest. In alleys and in the wilderness, leaders. 
out of sight of kings' palaces, the Church had thriven better 
than under shadow of the imperial upas-tree. The Emperor, 
surrounded by a greedy faction of Eusebian councillors, 
became semi-Arian by conviction. Thenceforth he acted 
sometimes as mouthpiece, sometimes as cats paw, of the Euse- 
bians. His unreasonincr arrosfance suited him for either Con^tan- 
task. No hesitation or bashfulness hindered his usefulness. 1"!!^^''"'"''" 
Ignorant, if not stupid, no problem awed him. His will, he 
said in open council of the Church, was as good as a canon ^ 
He began to regard himself as above all human limitations, 
to style himself lord of the universe^ to substitute for ' His 

1 Eudoxius at Constantinople. On taking the episcopal throne his first 
words were, ' The Father is dae^ris; the Son euo-e/Si/s.' 

2 Photinus. 

^ Cf. the rival councils of Sardica and Antioch. 

* Ingemuit totus orbis, et Arianum seesse miratus est. In this paragraph 
the worst, i. e. the political, side of Arianism is depicted. There is no inten- 
tion to prejudge controversial rights or wrongs. 

^ oirep iyhi /3ot5Xoyuat toOto k(x.vo)v, fKeye, vo/xi^ecrdoj. — Athan. Hist. Ar. ad 
Mon. I. 33, p. 732 c. 

® Amm. Marc. xv. i. 3. 

R. E. 8 



34 CONSTANTIUS. 

Majesty ' a new title ' His Eternity,' and having scaled the 
heights of solitary pre-emineiice to assert like dominion in 
Church as in State. In return for the aggrandisement and 
privileges he conferred upon the Church, he claimed a sole 
jurisdiction within it^: and the more worldly of the Church's 
members acquiesced without compunction in the nefarious 
bargain. By his ipse dixit he could banish the bishop^ of 
bishops, the head of Christendom ; he could starve a coun- 
ciP into submission, or roundly declare to recalcitrant ortho- 
dox bishops that he had determined to take the law into 
his own hands, and establish peace in the Church without 
their aid. His infallibility was more infallible than the 
Pope's own, for his decision was valid even when pronounced 
anything but ex cathedra. At the Council of Milan, having 
summoned the conclave from their proper place of meeting 
to his own imperial palace, he burst in upon the assembled 
bishops with the words*, ' The doctrine you are combating is 
mine ; if it is false, how comes it that all nations have been 
made subject to my power?' And once again, as the dis- 
cussion waxed hot, he cried, 'Have I chosen you to be my 
counsellors, and shall my will be thwarted still ? ' 

Such were the leaders who swayed the destinies of 
Church and State ; such the court and such the Christianity 
beneath whose aegis Julian was nursed. 

1 De Broglie, L'Eglise etc. iii. p. 363: ' Se croyant maitre de I'Eglise, 
il lui convenait que I'Eglise, a son tour, fut maitresse de tout. II lui 
promettait la domination pour la consoler de la servitude.' 

^ Liberius. ^ So. the Council at Ariminum. 

* Luc. Cal. pro Athan. i. p. 834 b. 



CHAPTER 11. 

JULIAN'S BOYHOOD, YOUTH, EDUCATION, AND CAESARSHIP. 

" This should have been a noble creature — he 
Hath all the energy which should have made 
A goodly frame of glorious elements 
Had they been wisely mingled." 

It is not too much to say that Julian's personal motives, 
qualities and aims, all-decisive as they were in determining 
the character of the great reaction which history must always 
couple with his name, would remain a riddle, had no notices 
of his early years survived. The thoughts, training and ex- 
periences of Julian's boyhood and youth shed floods of light 
upon his subsequent career: they convert a historical surprise 
and crux into a consequent and little complicated narrative. 

Among the earliest events indelibly impressed upon the Julian' ^i 
memory of the imaginative child of six must have been ^ ^ °° ' 
those days of horror when he and his brother Gallus, hidden 
away in the obscure recesses of a church, listened in hushed 
terror to the tramp of soldiers and cries of bloodshed, watched 
the anxious faces of their protectors, the good Mark of 
Arethusa and his servants, and heard the whispered news 
passed from mouth to mouth of the death of those nearest 
and dearest to them. The sun of the sons of Constantine rose 
blood-red with the slaughter of their kin. Two uncles and 
four^ cousins were the first-fruits of dominion offered up by 

1 'Seven,' writes M. Talbot in his Etude sur Julien p. v., misunder- 
standing (as appears in his subsequent translation), the passage in Ep. 
ad Ath. 270 c. The i^ ave\pLoL there spoken of include the two uncles and 

3-2 



3G ' JULIAN. 

him, whom the orphaned survivor might well call the butcher 
of his family \ These things remained to Julian the un- 
utterable horrors of a tragedy which he shuddered to recall. 
In this indiscriminate and most unnatural carnage fell Julius 
Constantius, younger brother of the great Constantine and 
father to Julian. Alone of indirect branches of the Imperial 
house, his two sons survived the hideous massacre. If 
Constantius blamed fortune for having thus preserved them, 
he yet shrank from forthwith imbruing his hands yet more 
deeply in innocent blood. The oversight might be forgiven : 
the danger was not imminent. An emperor might spare 
awhile a child of six, and a boy of thirteen already, it was 
said, smitten with a deadly disease". Thus Julian was saved. 
A mother's care he had never known, for the accomplished^ 

Julian's elder brother; the Greek clearly runs i^ iJ.iv dve\{/Loius , ifik 8L.. 

Moreover there were not seven cousins of the Imperial stock left to murder. 
The six d.pe\l/iol are : 

(1) 7rttr)//3 ifjibs, eavrov 5i Beios, sc. Julius Constantius, father of Julian, 
and uncle to Constantius. 

(2) Trpbs TraTpbs deios not Dalmatius, but a second brother of Jul. 
Constantius, apparently named Constantine. 

(3) irp€(f^ijTaTos d5e\<p6s of Julian, sc. an elder son of Jul. Constantius 
and Galla: brother to Gallus, and half-brother to Julian. We do not else- 
where hear of him. 

(4) (5) Dalmatius and Anuibalianus, cousins alike to Constantius and 
to Jtdian. 

The sixth remains uncertain. ? Constantine jun., son of the Constantine 
who was brother to Jul. Constantius. It was not Nepotianus, as Talbot 
says, for he survived till 350 a. d., when his feeble rivalry with Magnentius 
for the purple ended in his death. See Appendix A. 

^ Constantius' personal incrimination in these murders is habitually 
assumed, without very convincing proof. The chief witnesses against him 
are Athan. Hist. Ar. ad Monach. c. 69, p. 776 b, Jer. Chron., Zos. ii. 40, 
p. 106, as well as Julian himself ad Ath. 270. Sokr. iii. 1, Eutrop. x. 9 and 
Aur. Victor imply a minor degree of guilt, allowing but not inciting to 
murder. Greg. Naz. Or. iv. xxi. p. 550 b. makes Constantius Julian's Saviour. 
For the sequence of events cf. de Brog. UEglise tLc. iii. p. 10 n. as against 
Tillemont, Hist, des Emp. iv. 313 pp.; see infr. p. 43 note. 

2 Soz. V. ii. 9. 

3 Of Basilina we know but httle. Amm. Marc. xxv. iii. 28 mentions her 
noble lineage. Julianus, the praetorian prefect, was her father. According 
to Amm. M. xxii. ix. 4 she was distantly connected with Eusebius, the 
Arian Bishop of Nikomedia. Of her brother Julianus, Comes Orientis under 



I 



BOYHOOD. 37 

Basiliua had survived but a few months the birth of her Julian 
first-born. But the child promised to inherit something oi^J.^^^ 
his mother's fondness for the poems and masterpieces oinius. 
ancient Greece. At least he drank in with avidity such 
Homeric or Hesiodic or philosophical lore as the family eunuch 
Mardonius, his precise and old-fashioned pedagogue, was mw. 352 b 
pleased to instil. The child's eager teachableness must have 
often recalled even to the harsh eunuch reminiscences of the 
mother whom he had led along the same paths. ToEusebius, 
the Arian bishop of Nikomedia, it was entrusted to bring up 
the child, with whom on the mother's side he was distantly 
connected, in the way of the imperial religion\ About his 
religious education neither Julian himself nor his biographers 
enter into detail. He no doubt passed through the regular 
stages incident at that age to the Christian catechumen and 
neophyte — was counted among 'the purified,' 'the illumi- 
nated,' and 'the perfected' in orderly succession — received the 
seal of baptism — participated in the Eucharist — was instructed 
in the services of the Church, and initiated into the highest 
mysteries of faith and dogma^ The old culture and the new 
faith were each to mould his intellectual and moral growth: 
from the poison of Paganism he was to be guarded inviolate. 
For six years or more he was nurtured thus, in the society of 
tutors and grown-up folk alone. With no father's or mother's 
love to win his confidence, cut off from home affections, 
separate from other children, he enjoyed none of those bright 
sunny influences which are most essential to the free develop- 
ment of all child-nature. Mardonius, whatever his moral 
worth, was at least no congenial companion for a quick and 
susceptible child. He was Scythian-born, and rough in Mis. 352 a 
manner ^ A eunuch moreover, well-advanced in years and 

Julian till Ms sudden death in 363, we know little good. For Basilina'a 
study of the Classics and for her premature death, Julian himself is our 
witness, Misop. 352 b. 

^ Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 552 A. 

2 E. Lam^ elaborates on this with almost fanciful minuteness. It is 
odd that Miicke, Julian's Leben und Schriften p. 70, should so vehemently 
and pertinaciously argue that Julian was never baptized. 

^ Misop. 352. Julian does not omit to notice significantly the corre- 



38 JULIAN. 

not free, we may conjecture, from the repellent aspect, and the 
dwarfed moral nature that characterised his unhappy class \ 
His virtue, if such he possessed, was of a severe, forbidding 
type: he mistook distant surliness for dignity, harsh insensi- 
bility for wise reserve ^ He was a precisian and a martinet, 
and made his pupil's life one monotonous round. In going 

Mh.55iA B, to school he must perforce walk always by the same road and 
keep his eyes fixed upon the ground: he must regard "with 
philosophical or puritanical aversion the pantomime, the 

j//^. 351 CD dance, the horse-race, everything indeed that to a Roman boy 
savoured at all of fun or excitement. If ever, as happened 
twice or thrice, he went to the theatre, it was by order, as a 
part of educational training: if the child's heart longed for a 
dance or a romp about the garden, he was drearily referred 
to the dancing of the Phaeacian lads, the piping of Phemius 
or Demodokus, the bowery isle of Kalypso or the garden of 
Alkinous, as far more delicious than the living reality. 

3;«. 353E, He was properly steeped in philosophy from Sokrates to 
Theophrastusl Thus at the most critical time of life all his 
spontaneity and natural affectionateness of disposition was 
chilled and nipped. A remarkably beautiful character was 
strangely marred. Not only, like all children who are thrown 
much or entirely with their elders, did he become precocious 
in habits and thoughts. He was by nature a wistful dreamy 
child, full of strange reveries ; from his earliest years he 
would be possessed by a strange elation of soul as he gazed 
upon the splendour of the sun, and would strive to meet his 

spondence of name between his pedagogue and the general who urged 
Xerxes to the invasion of Hellas. We can hardly be sure how much of 
real esteem and gratitude towards Mardonius lurks under the satirical 
tone adopted in the 3Iisopogon : the passing notice in Oi: viii. 241 c, 
which seems best referred to Mardonius, is affectionate ia tone. Liban. 
Epitaph, p. 525 calls him /SAtiotos autppociv-qs (pu\a^, but what else could 
he say of him who made Julian a ' Hellene ' ? Miicke p. 6 — 10 takes the 
more unfavourable view and is pulled to pieces for it by Eode, p. 23 note. 
^ Cf. Amm. Marc. xiv. vi. 17 ; xvi. vii. 4, 8; xviii. iv. 5, and v. 4. 

2 KaXQy (re/xfOTTjra Tr]v d-ypoLKiav Kal <TW<ppoavvriv t7]p dvaiadrjaiav. — Mis. 
351 c. 

3 His young days may forcibly remind the reader of passages in John 
Stuai-t Mill's Autobiography, Ch. i. 



85J c. 



BOYHOOD. 39 

rays with unblenching eyes ; or again under the pure firma- 
ment, a child-worshipper, would meditate upon the wonder of 
the stars till all thought of self, all sense of surrounding sights 
or sounds were swallowed up in yearning contemplation of 
the Gods\ This rich emotional nature was all forced in upon 
itself: there was no one to encourage his child-confidences, or 
guide them into true channels. Hard experience made him 
day by day increasingly and sadly worldly-wise : reserve, dis- 
trust, dissimulation becaine a second nature to him^ The 
dullest reader may feel touched at the sad self-conscious irony 
of the Misopogon, as Julian with ill-concealed bitterness 
traces his rough ungraciousness of manner, his severe un- 
sympathising view of life to the training of that loveless 
childhood: almost against his will he tells us how the iron 
had entered into his soul, and to his last day rankled there. 
From self-recorded traits of boyhood, nay even from the 
letters of his manhood, considering what a training he had 
endured, we see how full he by nature was of tender brim- 
ming lovingness. He possessed to a singular degree the two- 
fold power of attaching others to himself, and not less him- 
self to others. If he came out of the ordeal so frank and 
loyal a friend, so thoughtful and sympathising a master, so 
grateful and humble a disciple, so fervent and self-forgetful a 
worshipper of all that he believed good and true, what might 
not a happier training have made him? 

But fate gave no amends for past unkindness. At thirteen juUan at 
years of age, when in years he had but just passed from the -^^*''^^^^"*- 
child into the boy, but in thought and premature discretion 
was almost full-grown, Julian was removed from Constanti- 
nople^ to a new home. The jealous suspicions of Constantius 
could not suffer any prince of the blood royal so near the 

1 Or. IV. 130 c D. ' Emptier declamation was never written,' says the 
remorseless Schlosser [Jena. Zeit. p. 126), and denies all the nobler motives 
accentuated by Neander and Herwerden. 

2 ^eos, (paal, devripr] (pijcris, Misop. 353 A, says J., speaking of his own 
education. 

3 It is possible that the death of Eusebius, his relative and mentor, in 
842 A.D. (aecorduag to other authorities 341 a.d.), contributed to this. See 
A'p:e. B, Note 3. 



40 JULIAN. 

seat of power. Julian and Gallus', hitherto designedly kept 
separate, were now together banished to the wilds of Cappa- 
docia. Not that the royal chateau of Macellum* was in it- 
self unpleasing. True it was far from the haunts of men: 
yet placed on a spreading plain skirted by woods that climb 
towards the snowy peaks of the Argaean range, its natural 
situation was lovely and picturesque enough: without were 
gardens and fountains ever flowing, while within doors the 
appointments were admirable, the fare and service princely. 

ad Ath.ina But to Julian it was in his own words an oriental state- 
prison. It was heaven's help, not man's kindness, that 
brought him safely through. His sole gain was the society of 
his step-brother Gallus, itself a questionable advantage. Not 
only was Gallus several years his senior: in character as in 
looks he was a complete contrast to Julian. His rough 
untutored mind, his strong natural passions were the very 
reverse of Julian's refined intellectual taste, and gentle self- 
controlled demeanour. A Titus was linked to a Domitian^. 
And Gallus' natural violence and savagery were aggravated, 
not subdued by the treatment to which the two brothers 

ad Ath. 271 were in common subjected. Immured like very prisoners, 
kept under secret espionage as well as open surveillance, cut 
off from every play-mate, every teacher, every servant even 
in whom they could repose confidence, they were forced to 
consort with slaves ever on the watch for an unguarded word 
or look. Suspicion was the very air they breathed, repres- 
sion of each natural sentiment the alphabet of their moral 
training. Under such auspices they 'sucked the milk of 
godly doctrine'* from paid agents of the tyrant. Stinted of 

1 Gallus Lad been educated at Ephesus, on his ancestral property. 
Sok. III. i. 

^ Macellum was in the immediate neighbourhood of Mons Argaeus, 
(the modern Argi or Arjish Dagh), at whose foot lay Caesarea, previously 
Mazaca (cf. Amm. M. xx. ix. 1), the capital of the district. For accoimts see 
Soz. V. ii. and Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 550 c. 

3 Tautum a temperatis moribus luliani differens fratris, quantum inter 
Vespasiani filios fuit Domitianiim et Titum. — Amm. M. xiv. xi. 28. 

4 Theod. E. H. in. ii., and cf. Jul. ad Ath. 271 o with Soz. H. E. v. ii. 
and Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 551 a. 



YOUTH. 41 

more liberal culture, the youthful princes were taught the 
Christian evidences, were trained to give alms, to observe 
fasts, to venerate and with their own hands rear the shrines 
of martyrs, and even to officiate themselves in the services of 
the Church. 

Such was Julian's life from thirteen to nineteen ^ such his Julian's 
preparation for the more active existence on which he next iIq^°^^' 
entered. What was the character of his sentiments at this 
time? Endowed by nature with intellectual capacities of. a 
high order, he was yet by no means the mere student or 
recluse. The blood of Constantius Chlorus ran in his veins. 
The course of his life testifies to the full the practical vigour, 
the ardent courage, the restless indefatigable craving for 
action that animated him. It was because all other channels 
were closed to him that Julian plunged with characteristic 
vigour into literary pursuits. Though devoid, as his works 
testify, of originality or of actual genius, he was possessed of 
a quick active intellect, and of receptive powers of the very 
first order. The grace of style, the abounding readiness of 
allusion, the variety of knowledge he displays, show with what 
diligence and with how great success he steeped himself in 
the productions of the greatest writers of Greece. But his 
intellectual labours are for our immediate purpose less 
material; it is rather his religious standpoint at this juncture 
that we must seek clearly to realise. 

That Julian was a professing Christian there is no doubt. Julian's 
Not only was he intimately acquainted with the Bible, and a ^^^^^^*^"' 
practised theologian versed in patristic lore ; but in his out- 
ward life he attended divine service, observed fasts, practised 
scrupulously the regimen of ecclesiastical discipline, built 
shrines to the holy martyr Mamas, and performed subordinate 
clerical functions. All this however, it is manifest, proves 
nothing whatever as to his private convictions. Theodoret*^ 
states explicitly that 'fear of Constantius' instigated these 
outward exhibitions of Christianity. ■ Christian or no Chris- 
tian, he must regulate his outward conduct as such. It was 

1 See App, B. Note 3. 

2 Theod. in. ii. Cf. Jul. E]^. 42, 423 c. 



42 JULIAN. 

a part of the yoke laid upon him. Christianity was one of 
the accomplishments he was to acquire. To demur, to object, 
to rebel might have cost him his life. He was too sub- 
jugated now, and what is more, too discreet to think for an 
instant of anything but passive submission. By this time 
too he had become too practised a dissimulant to betray him- 
self by unguarded words or acts. Years later, even when 
joint-empei'or, in an outlying province, surrounded by trusty 
legions, while in j)rivate practice and conviction he was a 
complete Pagan, to all outward seeming he remained a 
Christian. How much more then as a solitary, defenceless 
youth! Not that he had become as yet even at heart an 
open dissident, a pronounced unbeliever'; but rather that the 
religion, which he obediently accepted in externals, bad laid 
no hold upon him inwardly, while his bias was to see and 
notice the objections and imperfections with which it was 
surrounded. 
Feeihirjs Such at least would seem a priori the probable state of 

towards |]jg caso, if WO Consider how Christianity presented itself to 
Constan- i i 

tius. him. it came to him under roj^al stamp and warrant, as 

the religion of his oppressors. It was part of his discipline, a 
wise prison-rule, so to speak, that the most beneficent 
Constantius was pleased to lay upon him. His gentle cousin ^ 
. who had made him an orphan, had butchered his kinsmen, 
had driven him into exile, had treated him as a slave, pro- 
vided him now with a religion. Would Julian be very eager 

1 M. Lam^ {Julien VApostat, p. 25, 26), who kno'ws a vast deal of what 
Mardonius thought aud said to his pupil, writes thus of Julian's youth : 
' Julieu sut que la creation et la lutte primitive des Elements, qui ne sent 
qu'esquiss^s k grands traits dans la Genfese, se trouvent avec tons leurs 
details dans He'siode ; que le Dieu Eros, qui f^conde le chaos et en fait 
Bortir I'ether et le jour, est la parole de Dieu, disant que la lumibre soit; 
que le rfegne de Cronos et I'invasion des maux par I'imprudence de Pandore 
correspondent k la chute de Thomme et k I'imprudence d'Eve ; que la 
mutilation d'Uranus et la naissance d'Aplirodite sont les details du deluge 
&c. &c.' in the same style : but I see no traces of Juhan having been so 
clever or ' advanced ' as M. Lam^. 

2 6 (pLXauOpcowSraTos ovtos /SactXeus, writes Julian, In one of the bitterest 
passages of his manifesto to the Athenians. Ep. ad Ath. 270 c. Cf. 6 
KoXbs KuvcTTai'TLos, ibid. 273 b. 



EDUCATION. 43 

to accept it unquestioned ? With his works before us it is no 
mere conjecture to say that the first instinct of Julian's 
youth was a terrifying awe and a shrinking abhorrence of 
ConstantiusS He speaks of the \vKO(f)tXia he was forced to Ep.68. 
assume : says how he shunned the hated presence ; and w^hat 
efforts it cost him to lodge under the same roof with his 
father's murderer. It was well enough for courtier slaves to 
palaver of Constantius' past innocence, of his present regrets, 
his wish to make amends, his sense that his childlessness was 
a deserved judgment from on high^ but Julian had facts to 
speak to him as well as servile mouths. The Emperor ha,d 
first spoiled him of his kin, then stripped him anew of every 
friend, then robbed him of liberty itself, and should he in re- 
turn accept without demur the boon of the religion that he 
offered? Fear, suspicion, resentment, hate, passions not less 
potent because assiduously masked, were all enlisted against, 
not for the religion of the tyrant. 

Nor could the religion commend itself by its own virtue. Imperfect 
Christianity, it must never be forgotten, was set before Julian 'christian- 
in the mangled imperfect form of Arianism. From his later i^y- 
writings, from the contemptuous scorn with which he almost 
invariably treats the teaching and even the name of Christ, 
it may safely be affirmed that the moral beauty of Christ's 
character and work had never captivated the imagination of 
the Apostate; and there is little w^onder in this, considering 
how violently Arian was his training, and also how that heresy 
neglects and tends therefore to mar and deface the true 
personality of Christ. 

But not only was this mutilated distortion of Christianity Insincere 
the aspect of it displayed to Julian; even this was propounded ^«^<^'^^^®' 

^ Cf. the narrative in Zonar. xm. x. p. 21. 

2 Ep. ad Ath. 271 A. b. As the passage is important in respect to 
Constantius' direct implication (cf. p. 36) in the murders of 337 a. n., it 
shall he quoted in full. ^ere/tAT^o-e yap avrip, <paai, Kal id-qx^V Seivus, 
awaLdiav ri evrevdev vofjii^ei bvarvxeiv, rd re es tovs iroXefiiovs roiis Jlepaas 

ovK evrvx^ss irpd.TTei,i> €K roirixiv VTroXa/n^dvei 'iXeyov rocravTa Kal 8t] Kal 

'^TteiOov ij/xas, Stl to, fief diraTridds eipydaaro, rd 8^ j8.'^ Kal rapaxais et'fas 
drdKTov Kal rapaxiiSous ffTparevfiaTos. Similarly in the First Panegyric of 
Constantius [Or. i. 17 a), the blame is transferred to the agents, who trans- 
gressed the wishes or orders of Constantius. 



44) JULIAN. 

by most unworthy advocates. There is no positive evidence 
that one sincere Christian was numbered among the young 
prince's tutors: such were not readily found, nor greatly 
patronised among the dependents of Constantius: certain it 
is that most of his teachers were either wholly careless, or 
else Pagans in disguise, as they openly became so soon as 
the court breezes blew that way. Julian is hardly to be 
blamed if he regarded with indifference or even concealed 
dislike an enforced religion propounded so imperfectly, and 
commended so disadvantageously. 

On the other hand, what w-ere his relations towards 
Paganism? Besides his day-dreams, his yearning reveries, 
his communings with a felt but unknown Deity, his foremost 
pleasure was his books. They distracted him from the 
miserable present: in Homer he could revel by the hour, for- 
getful of frets and troubles and perils looming in the distance ; 
Plato was already perhaps his darling author ; Aristotle's 
keen dialectics were familiar ground \ And in all these 
authors whom he loved the best, in the poets and historians, 
in the orators and philosophers of Greece there was one 
common property; they were believers in and teachers of a 
polytheistic creed. Compared with their garlands of ever- 
lasting flowers, the writings of divines and longdrawn dis- 
cussions on dogma or Christian evidence seemed colourless 
and perfumeless indeed. Was it not a legitimate inference 
that the inspiration of each was drawn from the creed, and 
that the value of the creed might be in some measure deter- 
mined by the efficacy of the inspiration? At this age, be it re- 
membered, the Bible had not yet attained, the chosen Classics 
had not yet lost that common sanction of the wisest, which 
conferred on them something more than their inherent lustre. 
The critic and schoolman still handled the Bible with con- 
tempt. Like Mohammed claiming the Koran as his tru6 
miracle, Paganism could point to her Homeric scriptures, 
that 'Old Testament' which enlisted nay enforced the admir- 
ing reverence even of the disbeliever, and say 'These are the 

1 This literary fii^preciativeness was the prime difference, which made 
the identical training of the two brothers bear frxiits so dissimilar. 



EDUCATION. 45 

seal of my Apostleship.' Julian must tlius early have begun 
to feel, what in later life he continually reiterates, that the 
splendid afflatus of the old culture was the gift of the Gods 
whom it reverenced. 

This growing bias towards Paganism could not but tend View of 
to develope. It was Julian's misfortune to be brought up on *^*'*^*'"- 
book-learning without the healthy corrective of practical 
observation. Cut off from his fellows, except a picked and 
unworthy few, he saw things from the student's point of 
view; he became what in great part he continued to be 
through life, a pedant. Defrauded of all opportunity of 
testing their practical influence upon men's lives, he judged 
creeds by their self-enuntiation or their literary results. No 
view of polytheism could have been more favourable. What 
he knew from personal observation of Christianity, what he 
witnessed of its moral power, was not encouraging: the man 
he most hated for his crimes was the man most loud in 
Christian profession; the paid satellites, who were his spies 
and tools, were one and all Christians. Of Paganism on the 
other hand he knew only, on the positive side, that it was 
the avowed creed of all those whose works he most 
cherished and admired, and still the living^ faith of one-half 
the Roman Empire ; on the negative, that it was the faith 
not only hated by those whom he hated, and suspected by 
those who suspected him, but also feared for its power by 
those who prohibited him contact with its more gifted ex- 
ponents. Not that such thoughts as these were consciously 
present to Julian in a developed form: he had not yet for- 
mulated a theory ; self-analysis and introspection had not 
proceeded thus far. Some Sokrates was needed with skilled 

1 The term may seem strong, but cf, Miicke, p. 33. ' Nicht lange nach 
Julian's Tode versclilangen die Hellenenverfolgungen nicht weniger Opfer 
als einst die der Christen und richteten sich sogar gegen das zarte weibliche 
Geschlecht, Gerade der Umstand, dass viele der edelsten Hellenen fiir 
ihre zwar falsche, aber doch aufrichtige Ueberzeugung den Martyrertod 
starben, weU sie mit der vaterlichen Eeligion nicht die einzige Grundlage 
ihres sitthchen Denkens und Handels verlieren woUten, beweist unwi- 
derleglich, dass der Hellenismus, wenn auch unheilbar krank und dem 
sicheren Tod geweiht, doch noch eine lebende, wenn auch keine trostende 
Macht war.' Such I imagine it appeared at this time to Juhan, 



46 JULIAN. 

maieutic art to bring them to the birth; but dormant they 
lay there, a self-sown seed ready to spring up under the first 
warmth of sympathy, or the dew of judicious instruction. 
Bias tn- That such was Julian's state of mind is quite confirmed^ 

!f^'.!'.!.. by such intimations as remain. 'From the first rudiments 
of boyhood,' writes Ammian^ 'his bias was towards Pagan- 
ism; little by little with growing years his devotion that way 
grew with him. In fear and trembling, yet as often as he 
was able, he meditated in secret on all that looked thither- 
ward.' With his own lips he himself declares with what 
Or. 4. 130 c D strange fascination in those early days he gazed upon the 
sun and stars, so that wholly forsaken of earthly thoughts, 
he was possessed with the beauties of heaven, and, a beardless 
astrologer, entered into strange and sensible rapport with 
them, as he pondered then upon the Gods. There is yet 
another testimony, which though rejected by some as coming 
from hostile sources yet seems so natural as even to invite 
belief. In the training of catechumens it was an established 
practice to set the students rhetorical theses, which con- 
stantly took the form of apologetic defence or attack upon 
Christianity^. In such school- room exercises Julian*, it is 
said, was prone to conduct the defence of Paganism with 
unseemly vigour and ingenuity against the less impartial 
Gallus. Here is a genuine representation in the concrete of 
exactly that state of mind which it has been the aim of 
these pages to depict, and in which he continued to hang 
balanced until the day came when he bade adieu to Macellum, 
and by Imperial permission repaired to Constantinople. 

1 The passage in Ep. 51 (to the Alexandrians) proves nothing as to the 
sincerity of Juhan's Christianity. The statement does not amount to 
this, and is further made with a definite ulterior object in view. Ee- 
monstrating with the Alexandrians on their stupid and obsthiate adherence 
to Christianity, and urging them to become Pagans, he says : ' Be sure you 
won't go wrong in taking my advice, seeing that for twenty years I was a 
follower of that sect, and have now for twelve years been a follower of the 
Gods.' oix a/xapTTjcrecree ttjs opdris b8o0 ireiebtievoi. tQ iropevO^VTi K&Kelvrjp ttju 
65bv d'xpis eruu eiKoai /cat ravT-qv -rjoT) aiiv 6eoh vopevo/xhi{) SudeKarop ^ros. 

2 Amm. M. xxii. v. 1. 

3 Compare J. H. Newman, Jrians of the 'Fourth Century, p. 31, 32. 
* Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 557 a. 



EDUCATION. 47 

The five years that followed the recall from Macellum Julian at^ 
were decisive of the part Julian was to play in life. They ^ople. 
were passed in the prosecution of his studies, in the first 
instance at Constantinople. He received the training of an 
ordinary well-educated citizen : grammar he learnt of Nik- iifis. 354 a. 
okles^; his master in rhetoric was the sophist Hekebolius, a 
sort of Vicar of Bray of his times, who an Arian under Con- 
stantius, and a hot Pagan under Julian, pleaded ahjectly in 
the succeeding reign for readmission into the Christian 
communion. In philosophical acquirements as in natural 
genius he had by this time outstripped his instructors ^ 
Fairly beaten and baffled by the precocity of their pupil, his 
teachers had petitioned^ Constantius, that their young charge 
might be permitted to attend others of the more famous 
seats of learning. More important than this was the fact 
that in the metropolis his merits were too much before 
the world. It was not safe to leave a prince of the blood, 
brother to a reigning Emperor, free to his own devices. 
He was imprudent enough to make friends amid fellow- 
students and teachers ; unfortunate enough to attract the 
notice of citizens. Dangerous talk of his talents, his so- 
ciability, his fitness for Empire reached the Imperial ear. 
Constantius' suspicions took fire. He must leave Constanti- 
nople. Fondly hoping that literary zeal might foster political 
indifference and supplant dangerous aspirations, he ordered 
or permitted Julian to proceed to Nikomedia. There he was juUan at 
to remain under the eye of Hekebolius, and was solemnly ^^j^°"*^' 
pledged not to imperil his orthodoxy by attendance at the 
lecture-room of Libanius. Hekebolius cared little about the 
taint of Paganism*. Perhaps he imagined that it was the 

1 Sok. III. 1. 

2 Eunapius, Vit. Maximi, p. 68. 

3 This story of Eusebius is fairly enough called in question by Kode, 
p. 29. It seems an unlikely enough display of generosity and humility on 
the part of J.'s teachers. Both Lib. Epitaph, and Sok. iii. i. give only 
the second ground here alleged, viz. that of an imperial order, and that 
beyond a doubt was the deciding reason. Still Eunapius' account is just 
possible, and may remain in the text ' suspect.' 

^ LHoan.Epit. p. 527, asserts that the oath was exacted really by Hekebolius, 



48 JULIAN. 

personal influence of Libanius that alone need be feared. 
Be that as it may, Julian, though keeping the letter of his 
oath, was enabled day by day to peruse the lectures that he 
was forbidden in person to attend. He devoured them vora- 
ciously; he made them the model of his style. They fell in 
with his half-formed prepossessions. Predisposed to Hellenism 
alike by his philosophical and literaiy studies, and by the 
estimate of Christianity which personal experience had 
taught him, Julian responded to the advances made to him 
Contact by the leaders of the Neo-Platonist movement. They had 
Viataiiists ^^^ ^^^^^ arguments, and scoffs, and polite contempt for the 
Christian 'superstition,' but were also men of real culture, 
and not less of insight into character. They showed him 
sympathy, such as he had never before received: treated him 
with a kindness and deferential courtesy hitherto unknown 
to him: stimulated his industry, praised his acquirements, 
flattered his genius, entered into his difficulties. Their hazy 
cloud castles of mystic yearning and promise and hope, 
fabrics wrapped in visionary splendours, fascinated wistful 
longings nursed by the Phaedrus and the Republic; they 
chimed with 

those obstinate questionings 
of sense and outward things, 
fallings from us, vanishings ; 
blank misgivings of a Creature 
moving about in worlds not realised, 

of which his religious sentiment rather than conviction had 
consisted. He drank in the new Gospel. He was soon a 
convert to its creed. 
Julian's For to this period beyond all cavil his definite perversion 

to Paganism must be referred. Whatever his previous mis- 
givings or self-questionings, he had not definitely renounced 
Christianity before his arrival in Nikomedia in 851. Under 
more favourable auspices he might yet have been won for the 
Church. Had he for instance chosen Alexandria as his school, 

who was jealously afraid of his rival's attractive powers. This is clearly 
inconsistent with the idea of his having magnanimously petitioned in 
JuUan's favour. Probably he exacted the oath by imperial command. 



Apostasy. 



EDUCATION. 49 

and fallen under the influence of an Athanasius, it is curious 
to think wliat a transposition of his whole subsequent career 
might have resulted. The testimonies here are decisive. 
Not only does Sozomen single this out as the period of his 
conversion, and Libanius speak of him as at this time bridling 
his virulent hate against the gods, and, tamed by divinations, 
breaking loose like a lion from the chains which fastened him, 
but Julian himself designates his twentieth year as that in 
which he began first 'to walk with the gods\' For the young 
man of twenty — for Julian as for many another — the impres- 
sions now received, the emotions now awakened were to mould 
his entire future. To himself he seemed issuing out of dark- 
ness into day : 'let the time of that darkness be forgotten,' he 
writes, speaking of the years immediately preceding this 
period. Light was streaming in upon his soul, chasing away 
the shadows that had rested there and illuminating the 
heights that lay before him. He was not yet wholly satisfied : 
his soul still panted Excelsior!: the old cravings after a goal 
still unattained spurred him on. His shrewd teachers per- 
ceived them, and forged them into chains that bound him 
fast. By wise reticence, by suppressed allusions, by mystical 
hints and inuendoes, they taught the neophyte to believe 
that there were new glories, unknown ecstasies, more tran- 
scendent revelations awaiting the initiated believer. The 
fame of Aedesius attracted him to Pergamus. With all the Aedesius. 
gravity of age but all the enthusiasm of youth, Julian sat at 
the old man's feet drinking in breathless and open-mouthed 
the master's wisdom ^ Pressed to reveal those higher esoteric 
mysteries^ to which from time to time he would refer, the old 
man answered, 'Thou knowest all my heart, thou hast heard 
all my instruction; thou seest with thine eyes how feeble 
is this outward tenement of soul, and its frame nigh to disso- 
lution. If thou wouldst do aught, loved child of wisdom, get 
thee to mine own true-born sons, and there take thy fill of the 

.1 Soz. V. 2; Liban. Epit. p. 528, Prosphon. 408; Jul. Ep. 51, 434 d. 

2 Eunap. Vit. Maximi, p. 86—90. 

3 Liban. Prosph. 409. Epit. 528 dwells on the impression first produced 
on Julian by oracles and the various arts of divination. 

K. E. 4 



60 JULIAN. 

sweet juices of all wisdom and instruction: if tliou partici- 
patest in those holy mysteries, thou wilt verily blush to have 
borne the nature and name of man. "Would that Maximus 
EiiseUus or Priscus were here present ! But of my friends, Eusebius 
anthim. ' ^^^ Chrysanthius alone are left here. Take heed unto them 
and have compassion on my age.' Thus he was transferred 
to the teaching of Eusebius and Chrysanthius. At the close 
of elaborate philosophical discourses, Eusebius would utter 
obscure warnings against impostures that delude and mock 
the senses, magicians' acts, cheating and materialising men's 
conceptions by pretended miracles. On one such occasion 
Julian took Chiysanthius aside, and asked him to expound 
the meaning of such epilogues. Affecting a profound gravity 
he sagely replied, 'You will do well not to learn of me, but 
of their author;' in accordance with which advice he con- 
sulted Eusebius directly. After some fencing Eusebius, 
pressed hard by Julian's pertinacious curiosity, and finding 
him at length fairly in the net, told him of one Maximus, 
among the oldest and most honoured of their teachers, who 
with the magnificent boldness of genius, despising sober 
logical demonstration, applied himself to these fool's mani- 
festations. He then went on to say how Maximus had one 
day summoned them to the temple of Hecate; and how, 
after he had adored the goddess and burned incense and 
chanted a hymn, the statue of the goddess, as they sat there, 
smiled visibly upon him, and the torches in her hands took 
fire. At this recital, continues the narrator, the divine Julian 
bade him farewell and stick to his books; 'for you have 
shewn me the man I was looking for.' So saying, he kissed 
Chrysanthius and set off with speed for Ephesus\ 
Maximus. The story, even if its literal correctness is questioned^, is 
full of instruction and significance. It is a true picture of 

^ According to Sok. iii. 1, whom Niceph. x. 1 follows, Maximns came to 
Nikomedia to proselytize Julian; Ms statement arises perhaps from careless 
reading of Liban. ad Jul. Hyp. p. 376. In Liban. Prosph. p. 408, Ionia is 
given quite con-ectly. Teuffel p. 151 is hasty in imputing the opposite ver- 
sion merely to Eunapius' desire to flatter his sophist. 

8 As it is, forcibly enough, by Teuffel p. 151. Neander, Church Hist. iii. 
p. 54 note, and NavUle p. 53, use much the same language as the text. 



EDUCATION. 51 

the restless agitation, the yet unsatisfied cravings that were 
driving him forward at all hazards, the constant pursuit of a 
higher truth, a completer revelation than any as yet vouch- 
safed him. It betrays at once the ardour and the weakness 
that characterised him : he was full of excitable impetuosity, 
and not less of a wistful superstition. He possessed a tem- 
perament dissatisfied yet sanguine, a mind docilely receptive^ 
yet ardently inquisitive, a nature emotional rather than 
strong, imaginative and sensuous rather than calmly philo- 
sophical or patiently devotional. Maximus was a teacher 
well suited to such a pupil. To a venerable hoary beard, a 
quick searching eye, a rich harmonious intonation worthy of 
an Athene or Apollo, he united a commanding eloquence 
and a prophetic earnestness, that seem to have enforced 
assent, enchaining his hearers with a kind of awe. 'The 
hidden spark of divination' of which Libanius^ speaks, was 
quickly nursed into flame. Julian became, what he remained jzUian 
through life, his devoted adherent. After due probation he ^pP^ ■^^^' 
was solemnly initiated in the temple of Artemis^. To the 
accompaniment of weird chants and unholy rites, amid awful 
apparitions of demons and spirits of the departed, with every 
accessory suited to impress the imagination and stifle calm 
deliberation, Julian was admitted to the new faith. He was 
disinfected from the poUution'of Christianity*: the taint of 
baptism was washed off with the warm blood of a slaughtered 
bull sprinkled on his head®. From this time forth his con- 
version to Paganism was complete. The hopes of the party 
centred in him. He was in active correspondence or personal 
contact with the leading Neo-Platonists of Greece and Asia. 
His change of creed was not of course outwardly professed. 

1 Thus we do not find Julian originating one new fragment of pliilosophy, 
or even without hesitation propounding a new allegorical interpretation. 
^ Prosphon. p. 408. 

3 M. Lam^, Jul. VApost. c. iii., has brilliantly but fancifully worked up 
the events of successive days with the preparations, the surroundings, the 
words, looks, gestures and feelings of the principal actors into an elaborate 
bit of historical romance. 

4 Lib. Epitaph. 528. 

s De Broglie {L'Eglise, d:c., iv. p. 100) and others refer the event to 
the time of his pronounced apostasy in Gaul. 

4—2 



52 



JULIAN. 



Julianas 
conver- 
sion. 



The lion was unshackled, but had yet a while, says Libanius\ 
to wear the ass's skin. No sooner did whispers of his apo- 
stasy, of at least undue familiarity with Pagan teachers, begin 
to circulate ^ than Julian shaved close, wore the tonsure, 
observed saints' days, assiduously read the Scriptures in 
public, and adopted the outward demeanour of a monk^ 
But in private he indulged in Pagan practices and mystic 
rites. 

The rapidity and the completeness of Julian's conversion 
demand neither surprise nor blame. Christianity was pre- 
sented to him for perfunctory acceptance, not only in a 
maimed, disfigured shape, not only as the religion of his 
enemies, but also by wretchedly unworthy exponents. With 
Paganism his fortune was just opposite. Hellenism, wooing 
him in its most finished and becoming dress, courted his 
spontaneous acceptance, not only as the religion of new-found 
friends, but also as introduced to him by most worthy advo- 
cates. Not an Aedesius merely or Maximus 'the soul-phy- 
sician V but Libanius greatest of the sophists, lamblichus the 
most divine^, Themistius prince of orators®, Proaeresius king 
of eloquence^, such were the men through whom Julian 
learned Paganism. In the fact of his conversion® there was 
nothing unnatural nor ignoble, rather the reverse: it calls 



1 Epitaph, p. 528, cf. Greg. Naz. Or. tv. c. 79, p. 605 A. 

2 Amm. M. xsii. v. 1. To this period is attributed the epistle of Gallus to 
Julian, which, alluding to the sinister rumours afloat, adjures Julian to 
hold fast the memory of the martyrs and not forsake the religion of his 
fathers. Its authenticity is doubtful. For Gallua' communications with 
Julian cf. Philost. E. H. iii. 27. 

3 goz. V. 2. Sok. in. 1. Gallus, Ep. ad Jul. 
* Liban. ad Jul. Hyp. p. 376. 

s This lamblichus is not the well-known Neo-Platonist philosopher, 
author of De Vit. Pytliag., <f;c., for he died earlier in the century : but 
Julian applies to him, Ep. 27. 401 b, the deios — indeed BeibraToi — which, 
with 5ai/x6i'tos, was the characteristic epithet of lambUchus the elder. Cf. 
Or. 4. 157 c D, Or. 6. 188 b. Or. 7. 222 b, &c. 

® Gregory of Nazianzus calls Themistius ' the prince of orators. ' 

"^ Cf. the inscription upon his commemorative statue at Athens, '* The 
Queen of Cities to the King or Eloquence." 

s Herwerden De Jul. Imp. 12 pp. summarises very well the influences 
internal and external brought to bear. 



I 



EDUCATION. 63 

for pity, not for condemnation; it is the permanence of it 
rather, when but for prejudice and pride and bigotry a better 
judgment might have been formed, that awakes regret. It 
proved -too late to retrace his steps, when superstition, and 
pride of consisteucy, and intellectual self-sufficiency, and 
long-protracted pain of enforced disingenuousness, all barred 
the way. 

If anything was yet lacking to confirm Julian in his Death of 
adherence to Paganism, and alienation from Christianity, 
Constantius was careful to supply the want, Julian had still 
one relative in the world, cousin at once and brother-in-law* 
to the Emperor. His hour was now come to be brought to 
'The Butcher.' Gallus, who had hitherto disregarded Con- 
stantius' threats and evaded his orders, was now enticed by 
soft promises to leave his Eastern province and visit the 
Emperor in person. At first he journeyed with the state befit- 
tiug a Caesar; one by one, as the toils closed faster round him, 
the marks of homage were withdrawn; from Constantinople 
he was hurried away by imperial order : at Petobio (Pettau) 
creatures of the Emperor put him under arrest, stripped him 
of the purple, dressed him in common clothes, bade him 'Get 
up at once/ and so drove him in a post-chaise to Pola. The 
place^ was ominous: the blood of Crispus still cried from its 
prison walls. It was destined to witness yet another Caesar's 
death, falling victim to his kinsman's jealousy. Gallus was 
spared the mockery of a trial. His hands tied behind him, 
he was dragged like a common felon to the block. Even the 
decency of burial was denied to the mutilated trunk ^ 

^ Gallus and Constantius were connected as brothers-in-law by a double 
tie. An elder sister of Gallus had been Constantius' first wife, previous 
to his marriage with Eusebia: while Gallus had espoused Constantina, 
pister to the Emperor, and rehct of the murdered Annibalianus (cf. Ep. ad 
Ath. 272 d). See Genealogical Tables, Appendix A. 

2 'Near Pola,' says Amm. M. xiv. xi. 20, while Sok. ii. xxxiv. 4 and Soz. 
IV. vii. 7 designate the site of the murder as Flanona or Flavona, an island 
of Dalmatia ; it is at no great distance from Pola. 

3 In connexion with the murders that inaugurated the accession of 
the sons of Constantine, Dr Auer had already written {Kaiser Jul. &c. 
p. 4), " Gallus and Julian had one fault ; they could not forget, though 



54 JULIAN'S BOYHOOD, YOUTH, 

Julian Scarcely had the news of his brother's murder reached 

to CuurL Julian, when he too received the mandate to repair from the 
quiet retreats of Ionia 'to visit the Emperor in person.' 
There had risen in Constantius' mind a doubt whether the 
Imperial consent had been formally attached to his departure 
from Macellum^ It was an authenticated fact that only 
three years before the young prince-student had had an 
intersdew with his brother on his royal progress eastward 
aciAth.2isx through Nikomedia^ Letters had passed at intervals be- 
tween them. Besides there was an a priori probability that 
he was a co-conspirator. It was certain at least that he was 
connected by blood with the Emperor himself, and was now 
the sole offender who had not expiated by death that crime. 
Ep. 68. 'The wolf thought well to be his watch-dog. 
Julian at Treated like a prisoner, dragged backwards and forwards 

Court. between Milan and Comum, in daily terror of his life, forced 
aciAth.272D to guard every word and look, he learned bitterly enough that 
'it was better for him to entrust the care of his life to the 
gods than to the word of Constantius^.' Possessed with 
deep-seated hatred for the mui'derer, for whom he was forced 
to simulate affection and loyal respect, he transferred no 
doubt some portion of that hate to the religion he so loudly 
professed. 'How often,' says an eloquent writer*, 'as he 

Constantius would gladly have drawn a veil over the past :" but it required 
some impudence to add concerning the death of Gallus, (p. 38) " Juhan 
had no call to complain." To an ordinary reader the groimds alleged in 
Ep. ad Ath. 272 are not wholly trivial or unreasonable. 

1 Kode, p. 35, adopting Sievers' suggestion, Studien tfcc, p. 228, supposes 
Ammian to have confused the departm-e from Nikomedia with that from 
Macellum, thinking the charge as it stands too ridiculously unsubstantial. 
If however it was Gallus' entreaties had extorted a tacit assent, the Emperor 
may have scented a plot in fraternal good feeling. 

2 Amm. M. xv. ii. 7 places the inteiwiew at Constantinople, but is clearly 
outweighed by the authority of Libanius (cf. Epit. p. 527), a resident at the 
place, whose statement Sok. in. 1 corroborates. 

3 The words actually occur at a later crisis, cf. Zosim. in. 9; but in 
Ep. ad Ath. 273 a, Juhan attributes his preservation from Constantius' 
violence to the direct intervention of the gods. Significantly enough, in 
the letter referred to this is the first crisis of his Ufe where he acknowledges 
their direct guidance. 

* De Broglie, UEglisc ifcc, in. p. 28^. 



EDUCATION, AND CAESARSHIP. 55 

raised his eyes to heaven, must hie have seen, rearing itself 
between him and the God of Constantius, the bloody image 
of a father he had never known, and a brother that he dared 
not mourn,' 'His Eternity' had just reached the climax of 
arrogant self-sufficiency. He had cashiered^ a fourth Caesar. 
Persia for the nonce was quiet. Emperor of Emperors he 
aspired too to be counted Bishop of Bishops. With a brutal 
candour he asserted his lordship in Church as well as in State, 
in doctrine no less than in disciplined His civil supremacy he 
regarded as the proof and the measure of his religious ortho- 
doxy. Arianism was demonstrably orthodox, if Constantius 
was Arian. L^^glise c'est moi was the position to which he 
committed himself. To assert it he browbeat or bribed, 
menaced or cajoled, imprisoned or exiled, tortured or deposed 
refractory bishops, as seemed best. No prestige of office 
could protect Liberius from Thracian exile, no extremity of 
venerable age deliver Hosius from the rack. 

But it was not only a personal antipathy to Constantius, 
not only Constantius' own unworthiness^, or his supercilious 
domineering over the Christian commonwealth, that finally 
discredited Christianity in the eyes of Julian. These things 
only corroborated or accorded with results to which personal 
observation must have led him. The Christians with whom 
he chiefly came in contact during his residence at the court 
of Milan were beyond a doubt the Arian bishops who clung 
about the throne. They justified the bitter taunt of Liberius, 

^ se. Gallus. The first three alluded to are Magnentius, Vetranion and 
Nepotiamis. For the titles assumed by Constantius, see Amm. M. xv. i. 3. 

2 For Constantius' behaviour at the Council of MUan, see pp. 33, 34 : 
cf. also De Broglie's graphic narrative in UEglise &c,, iii. 258 pp. 

3 The colours in which this Emperor appears in these pages are un- 
deniably dark. The apologist of Constantius must draw his materials from 
almost any quarter sooner than his connexion with JuUan or his adminis- 
tration of Church matters. Throughout the two long elaborate panegyrics 
which Julian has left us, he was unable to record a single personal favour 
conferred on him by Constantius, with the exception of the elevation to 
the Caesarship. Even this solitary boon was accorded under pressure of 
imminent external dangers (Julian's irony in Or. i, 45 A b, as compared with 
ad Ath. 278 and the like is quite audaciously broad), and only after 
prolonged vacillation had finally persuaded Constantius that it would be 
more politic to robe Julian in the purple than to assassinate him. 



5G JULIAN'S BOYHOOD, YOUTH, 

by which he bade the Emperor remember that bishops were 
not created to avenge his wrongs\ It so chanced that the 
council of Milan synchronised with Julian's stay in the place. 
It is needless to dwell in detail on the scenes of quarrelsome 
turbulence, or on individual cases of duplicity that marked 
the hey-day -of ascendant Arianism, when a Valens and 
Ursacius swayed the helm of council, when honest men 
turned cowards, and wise men traitors, when prelatical 
violence and rancour and self-seekins^ drowned or srao'Cfed the 
voices of the solitary spokesmen of truth, and the blindness 
or timidity of her less unworthy leaders jeoparded well-nigh 
the existence of the Church of Christ. With what disdainful 
scorn must Julian in his hours of privacy have cast aside 
that mask of religion^ which he was forced to wear, and 
turned from the present to dream of Hellas, ' home of the 
Muses'! Almost at the very hour^ that he was joyfully turn- 
ing his back on the palace to journey towards his mother's 
hearth*, another illustrious exile also set his face north- 



^ Theod. II. xvi. 22, with which compare Athan. Hist. Ar. ad Mon. c' 
37 d-c. 

2 In the Fii'st Panegyric on Constantius — ^which, though dating from, 
a somewhat later period, viz. Nov. 355 a.d., represents to us JuHan as still 
fettered at the court — we are surprised at the most meagre recognition 
accorded to Christianity. Of Constantius' rehgious policy there is not one 
syllable. The expressions used to designate the Deity are barely neutral. 
If historic truth prompted Julian to speak of Maximian Hercules and Con- 
stantine Chlorus as worshipping ' The Higher Nature ' only {ttiv Kpeirrova 
(pvcTLv, 7 b), he might have found some more decisively Christian phrase 
than ' the deity bringing to happy fulfilment his destined end ' (t^c dfxap/xivrjv 
Te\evT7]v .rod dai/xovos fidXa dX^iav wapaaxovTos, 16 c) to describe the death of 
Constantine the Great. The ' All-good Providence ' is another paraphrase 
he employs for God : while Eome he describes (29 d) as ' the hill-top, where 
is enshrined the image of Jupiter.' The text seems to have undergone 
subsequent revision. 

3 Newman, Avians d-c, postpones the exile of Liberius till 356. But the 
coiincil of Milan sat at the very beginning of 355, and the proceedings 
against Liberius followed immediately. The expression in the text is that 
used by De Broglie, in. p. 272. 

^ ws ovv dwocpvyuv eKetdev acfievos iiropevbfi7]v eirl Tqv rrjt pL7]Tp6s eariav. 
Ep. ad Ath. 273 b. In Or. in. 118 b, Ionia seems designated by otKabe, though 
Athens eveutiially became his destination. Cf. also Ad Them. 260 a, diriuv 
de eirl t/ji/ 'EXXdSa irdXiv , oi)x Cos ev eopT^ rrj p,eyicT7] ttjv tvxv iTrawuf 



EDUCATION, AND CAESARSHIP. 67 

wards, Liberius, chief bishop of the west, wending his way 
to weary exile in Thrace, because he declined to condemn 
a brother bishop unheard! 

Thus we may consider that on Julian's arrival at Athens Julian at 
in the year 355 his prior alienation from Christianity had 
changed into positive aversion. The death of Gallus, the 
private and public bearing of Constantius, and the condition 
of official Christianity had riveted irrevocably the sentiments 
which Julian had derived from Macellum, from Nikomedia, 
and from Ephesus. At Athens he appears to have been 
initiated^ into the Eleusinian mysteries. Outward repres- 
sion and self-constraint only made his inward excitement 
more uncontrollable. The strange excited manner^, the 
restless gait, the twitching shoulders, the dilated rolling 
eye, the distended nostril, attracted the notice even of his 
masters and fellow- students. At times he would fall into 
reveries, and so with nodding head and swaying steps, 
pass through the streets half-distraught. Then with a 
sudden jerk, or a harsh peal of laughter, would turn 
upon his companion with some strangely abrupt inter- 
rogation. Never, not in the first moments of elevation to 
the Caesarship, not in the perils of his Gallic wars, not in the 
sole possession of sovereign power, can life have been more 
intense to him than now. In the immemorial courts of 
Athens those convictions were finally matured which have 
given its permanent significance to Julian's life. There he 
moved amid the most intellectual circles, and though of 
royal blood proved not unable to hold his own with the 
bravest in the peaceful combats of the schools. Amid stu- 
dents of no common calibre, such for instance as the young 
Cappadocians, Basil and Gregory, he shone by his own 

7]SicrT7]v ^(prjp etpai t-^v diJ,oi.j3rjP ifiol Kal rb Srj XeySfievov 

Xp-6crea. xaXKet'wi', iKard/J-jBoi evvea^oiuv 
^<pr]v dvTTjKKaxOctt ; compare App. B. note 4. 

1 For initiation Eunap. Vit. Max., Theod. iii. 3, Greg. Naz. Or. iv. c. 55 
576 B, cf. Or. VII. 231 d, Soz. v. 2. Here again, though the historicity of 
the bare fact might well be disputed, LamS 80 pp. revels in romancing 
every detail. 

2 Greg. Naz. Or. v. c. 23, p. 692 b. 



58 Julian's boyhood, youth, 

merit. Needless to say that by professors and rhetoricians 
of the Pagan interest — though indeed, as Libanius* assures 
us, he was to be counted among teachers rather than taught 
— he was at once instructed and caressed : but the true his- 
tory of his University life survives solidified in the thoughts, 
the writings, and the policy of maturer manhood. 
Julian's To this same period we must refer the rise of another 

vusswn. fQQi[-jr^g that laid strong hold upon Julian. He became 
impressed with the sense of a mission'''. He began to 
regard himself as the special instrument of the gods to 
fulfil the predestined restoration of Hellenism. Vague 
prophecies were current pointing to the imminent fall of 
Christianity; 'Peter,' said one heathen oracle, 'had by magic 
secured worship to Christ for three hundred and sixty five 
years; but thereafter his kingdom should falP'. Dreams of a 
Pagan Messiah floated through men's minds. Already the 
fabric of Christianity, triumphant externally, began to crum- 
ble from within. A seeming renaissance of Hellenism had 
set in. Julian, suggested far-sighted philosophers, and with 
growing buoyancy his own heart whispered the same hopes, 
alike by position and by actual gifts was the elect of heaven 
to consummate the change*. Such half-formed aspirations 
chimed admirably with his imaginative nature. His mind, 
like Constantino the Great's, was so tempered, that while 
he yielded willingly to superstition, he found in it rather 
a strength than a weakness. Julian could believe in a for- 
tunate star, could credulously attribute each happy chance, 
each trivial success, which was due clearly to his own fore- 
sight, to the direct interposition of the gods on his behalf; 
while at the same time he was never frightened by childish 
omens, or cowed by superstitious fears from boldly facing 
and resolutely carrying out enterprises that demanded all 

1 Epitaph, p. 532, cf. Zos. m. 2, p. 123. 

^ It is to this stage that Theod. iii. 3 refers Julian's first aspirations after 
empire, his consultation of oracles, and evocation of devils. "With this 
Liban. Epit. pp. 529, 565 fully agree. 

■■* Cf. Augustin, De Civ. Dei xviii. 53. 

* Henrik Ibsen, in his elaborate, but in details very unliistorical drama, 
The Emperor and the Galilean, draws this out powerfully. 



EDUCATION, AND €AESARSHIP. 59 

his hardihood and natural resource. It was at this time^ 
that he began to recognise the divine hand in each incident 
of his career; to hear voices or dream dreams, which he 
reverenced as supernatural monitors: to see in himself the 
favoured knight of Hermes and Athene. In his own lan- 
guage, from the day that he left Athens, the goddess was 
everywhere his guide, and compassed him about with guardian adAth.276B 
angels, assigned to him from the Sun and Moon. These 
things were signs of a growing self-confidence ^ presages of 
powers that as yet lay undeveloped, and indeed unsuspected, 
under the gauche exterior of the unprincely student. 

It does not fall within the scope of this essay to follow Julian as 
Julian on his return from Athens to court, to unravel the ^"^^'^''• 
court cabals and the Imperial hopes and fears which resulted 
in Julian's solemn investiture with the Caesarship and his 
espousal of Helena, sister to the Emperor. Nor are we con- 
cerned with the marches and counter-marches, that in three 
brilliant campaigns reduced Gaul and the Rhine provinces 
to entire submission to the young Caesar, and left him free to * 

devote his whole attention to administrative and economical 
reform in the provinces entrusted to him. He had set out 
under the ignoble espionage of his own officers ^ restricted in 
all his powers, thwarted at every turn by privy conspiracies 
and opposition, with a school-boy's manual* in his pocket 
regulating his powers, his money allowance, his very diet, a 
lay-figure dressed in purple to scare barbarians with the 
terror of a name, a sort of shadow apparition king, wearing 
'on his brow the round and top of sovereignty' and nothing 
more^ In three short years his native force, his industry, 

1 Cf. particularly Ep, ad Ath. 273 a, and the narrative Hid. 275 b sqq. 
The allegory of Or. vii., large selections from which are given later (Chap. 
VI.), corroborates the text. 

2 For his previous timorous self-distrust, see ad Them. 253 a b. 

3 ad Ath. 281 d sqq. * Amm. M. xvi. v. 3. 

^ Ep. ad Ath. 278, iTriTpiirei fioi /SaStfetc els to. arpaToireda to (rxvi^a, 
/cat Triv e'lKova Trepiolcropri ttjv eavrov' /cat yap roi Kal tovto etp7]T0 Kol 
iyiypawTO, 6ti rots TciXXotj o^ ^aaiKia dlduatv, dXXa rbv rrjv eavrov irpbs 
iKdvovs eiKOva KOfMiovvra, 



GO Julian's boyhood, youth, 

and his tenacity of purpose, had secured him a commanding 
ascendancy. His state of mind remained such as has been 
already described, though growing years and a career of 
almost unchequered success deepened no doubt his previous 
religious convictions. In life and belief a Pagan, in outward 
act a somewhat unpronounced Christian', he adopted a 
policy consonant with his ambiguous position. With, or 
more probably without his consent, his name was appended 
by Constantius to a law declaring it a capital offence to 
adore or sacrifice to idols. He interfered as little as possible 
with religious parties or disputes of any kind. Political 
necessities required perhaps his formal acquiescence in the 
banishment of Hilary, the young Bishop of Poitiers, from 
Gaul ^ But this was an isolated act, the omission of whicb 
must have alarmed the suspicions of Constantius and fanned 
his growing jealousy. Julian was too astute to provoke 
collision or give a handle to opponents by open professions 
of Paganism. He satisfied the requirements of imperial 
orthodoxy. Even after his army had by acclaim declared 
him worthy of the supreme dignity of empire, when open 
war was imminent, if .not proclaimed, between him and Con- 



1 The second Panegyric on Constantius, generally assigned to the year 
357 A.D., startles us by its unmistakeable renunciation of Christianity. 
The religious element introduced is Hellenistic to the core. Homer and 
Plato are the authoritative exponents of morahty and of the relations 
existing between soul and body, God and man (cf. pp. 68 — 70, 79, 82 — 84, 
&c.). Heathen myths are parabolic representations of truth. The Emperor 
is said to be a kind of priest or prophet (68 b). Besides the more general 
teaching and tone, we find the distinctively Pagan expression 'the king 
of the gods' {tuv 6eQv rbv pa<n\ia, 90 A, cf. sqq. ), while the disappearance 
of the traitor MarceUinus at the battle of Mursa is accounted for as the 
work of some god or demon (i;7r6 tov Oeuv 7} dai/xovcov Kpv<p6eis, 59 b). The 
ideal prince (Constantius) must be ovk dXiyupos depaweias Oewu (86 a). We 
are almost forced to infer that the origiual writing was recast by Julian or 
some editor's hand (De Brog. iv. 24 n.). Miicke p. 161 prefers to assign a 
later date to the original publication (see Chronol. Tables in App. B). The 
heathenism of Or. vni. ' Consolatory Eeflections on the departure of SaUust,' 
written early in 368 a.d., is more chastened — ^eo's for instance appears 
throughout in the singular — but there too the court of spiritual and theolo- 
gical appeal is Homer. 

2 De Broghe, L'Eglise, &c., in. 362. 



EDUCATION, AND CAESARSHIP. 61 

stantius, the young Augustus was still to be found wearing 
the ass' skin, and participating in Christian rites at Epiphany- 
tide in the church of Yienne\ It was on the march to meet 
Constantius that he publicly abjured Christianity, took the 
title of Pontifex^ and conducted sacrifice in Pagan templesl 
Even then deference to the feelings of not a few of his soldiers 
led him to temporise in some points*. But from Illyria he 
can write joyfully to his foster-father in philosophy : 'We ^p- 38. 
worship the gods publicly; the whole army which is 
following my fortunes are devout believers: we openly sacri- 
fice oxen : with many a hecatomb we render thank-offerings 
to the gods.' He issued to all true Greeks his Pagan mani- 
festo®. Confident in his mission, fortified by assurance of 
divine favour and looking for 'great fruit of labour,' amid «&. 
the plaudits of men and with heaven's smile, he set his face 
eastward to regenerate a misguided world and by the gods' 
behest 'to make all things pure.' ' ib. 

1 Amm. M. xxi. ii. 5. Zon. xiii. xi. p. 22 says Christmas. * Sok. in. 1. 

3 g_ g^ to Bellona, Amm. M. xxi. v. 1. Cf. Jul. ad Ath. 286 d. 

^ Zonar. xiii. xi. p. 22. 

^ The so-called Epistola ad S. P. Q. Atheniensem, which Zos. in. 10 
informs us was despatched to the Lacedaemonians, Corinthians and 
Athenians. 



CHAPTER III. 



NEO-PLATONISM. 



Religion go far as coDcerns pagan religion and philosophy, the 

Empire, centuries preceding Julian have been depicted in the Intro- 
duction to this Essay as a time of exposure and disintegration. 
Along with the gradual extinction of patriotism under the 
incubus of an enormous centralised despotism, they witnessed 
a decay of morals, a despairing surrender of primitive faiths, 
and throughout the most honoured schools a trepidation, a 
nerveless depression, and an impotence that presaged immi- 
nent extinction. The heartiest attempt at conservation was 
revived Platonism ; that^ acknowledged the great truth of 
the unity of God, and renounced the balder fallacies of idol- 
worship : but it lacked sound basis and inherent vitality ; it 
clung to extinct myths, and to solemn forms, and to edifying 
survivals of ritual, out of which all virtue and meaning had 
departed for generations, and which had long since become 
'rudimentary' appendages. In the hour of distress Mystery- 
worship with mischievous and ill-directed sympathy had 
tried to drown men's legitimate and reasonable cravings, and 
to intoxicate them out of consciousness of their despair. 
Christianity meanwhile had owed its strength and achieved 
its progress by recognising the misery, the helplessness, the 
degradation of the world, and by supplying it with a solution 
of its misery, and also with a hope of redemption from it. 
Neo- There was one other system which recognised the same 

Fiatonism. unsatisfied aspirations and present discontent, and strove not 

1 Capes' Age of the Antonines, p. 180 — 1. By revived Platonism I mean 
here and throughout the School of Plutarch &c. as distinct from Neo- 
Flatonism. 



NEO-PLATONISM. 63 

altogether ineffectively to prescribe an explanation and a 
remedy. This system was Neo-Platonism. Historically it 
was collateral rather than antagonistic to Christianity. . Its 
genius was philosophical, not sectarian ; it was the intellec- 
tual expression of that revulsion against scepticism and 
materialism, which distinguishes third century thought. 
Not only did Pyrrhonism and Epicureanism die completely 
out, but the intellectual revolt against them took a positive 
form. The craving after worship, after some sure ground of 
belief, after communion with the deity, in a word the 
spiritual element in man's nature reasserted itself, and 
evolved a philosophic system at once reverential, dogmatic, 
and spiritual. ' To scepticism the new philosophy opposed 
dogmatism, to materialism an ascetic idealism.' The astound- 
ing boldness of the attempt is one of its most striking 
features. Starting from no historical basis, and claiming no 
direct revelation, on the sole strength of intuitive belief, it 
assumed its fundamental truth, and thence passing from 
step to step, lost in excess of daring, framed a spacious and 
elaborate theology, by which it strove to solve or elucidate 
the inscrutable problems that on all sides confronted it. It 
reposed upon complete subjectivity : the soul turned inwards 
upon itself, and there read the nature of God and the riddle 
of existence. ' Perfect abstraction from all without, when the 
soul centres upon itself, beholds beauty past understanding is 
the realisation of the highest life and identification with the 
divine.' It remains, if nothing else, a standing witness to the 
permanent strength, the irresistible determination and the 
boundless daring of the spiritual instinct of man. 

In its original and most worthy cast Neo-Platonism was A religious 
a system of philosophy. The satisfaction it offered was^^"^'^^"" 
primarily intellectual, though it did not neglect, but indeed 
gave a splendid primacy to the spiritual element in man. 
In religious precision and definiteness of aim it towered 
above previous tentative efforts. It threw its whole strength 
of abstract thought and exposition into the fundamental 
questions concerning the being and attributes of God, the 
origin and existence of evil, the constitution and government 



64 NEO-PLATONISM. 

of the phenomenal world, the nature and powers of the human 
soul, and the relations connecting together matter, man and 
neJation God. The foundation of the system was laid in a reconstruc- 
plifhso"^^ tion or reinterpretation of Platonic teaching; but it claimed, 
phies. and not unsuccessfully, to absorb into itself all previous 
philosophies, all at least that acknowledged any active or 
even potential communion between God and man. It 
reconciled them not by arbitrary identification as offshoots 
from a common Platonic or Socratic stock, but as varying 
expressions of a single truth, which truth was declaied to be 
perfectly enshrined and secreted in Plato. It is this which 
gives to Neo-Platonism its markedly eclectic character. It 
assimilated mystic numerical formulae from Neo-Pythago- 
reanism ; it accepted all that was truest in the syncretic 
liberalism of revived Platonism : it endorsed the austere 
morality of the Stoic, and by its emanation system appro- 
priated his captivating Pantheism ; so far as mere reason was 
concerned it admitted the contention of the sceptic ; it 
practically borrowed from Aristotle his scientific methods 
and forms of thought ; while its obligations to Plato require 
no mention. It went further afield than Greek philosophy. 
Its new and hazardous conception of God as above all quality 
and specification, and its metaphysical separation of the 
Divine Mind from the absolute God is found in germ if any- 
where in the Judaeo-Alexandrine doctrines of Philo : its views 
of matter, its account of the communication of the Deity to 
phenomenal things through intermediate agencies and grada- 
tions of being, its transcendental conception of the Godhead 
itself exhibit striking analogies to Gnostic teaching, and at 
least a superficial resemblance to the most original results of 
Oriental speculation. But Neo-Platonism did not concoct 
an undigested conglomerate of rival ideas, and call it a 
philosophy. It gave organic unity to the elements it incor- 
porated. If it assimilated the strength, it radically modified 
the principle of Stoic Pantheism ; it gave up the hard 
mechanical notion of the literal transfusion of the Deity 
through all parts of the universe, for it justly appeared a 
profane and illogical materialising of God to suppose him 



NEO-'PLATONISM. 65 

actually present as fire or air-current or animating soul in 
all phenomenal objects. It substituted for this the more 
elevated notion of a dynamic and not a mechanical inherence, 
of an inward sustainment and impulse, an ever-present effect 
of divine will constituting for each creature the law of its 
being and the condition of existence. It recognised an 
indestructible duality, where Stoics discerned an indissoluble 
unity. To Chrysippus God was in all things ; to Plotinus all 
things were in God^. Again, Neo-Platonism, we have said, 
conceded, nay reaffirmed and emphasised the sceptic invali- 
dation of reason ; but it escaped the Nihilism, which ap- 
peared its logical corollary, by revealing and calling into play 
a new faculty transcending reason, superseding it both in 
scope and efficacy. Even to the dicta of Plato it yielded no 
servile obedience : it selected and developed at pleasure. 
Metaphysical hints from the Sophistes and Protagoras, 
enigmatic allusions or metaphors from the Republic, specu- 
lative imagery from the Timaeus equipped it with doctrines 
which so exceeded as almost to efface much of Plato's most 
essential teaching. Convinced of the untrustworthiness of 
phenomena and sense-knowledge, Plato had taken refuge in 
the Ideal theory. He had claimed objective reality for Thought 
and Knowledge. They alone were real ; their embodied 
forms peopled a suprasensual world of pure being. But the 
Neo-Platonist improved upon this conception. To him the 
Ideas^ the 'Intelligible Forms' as he called them, were not 
the highest and last grade. They retained indeed their 
exaltation above the world of sense, but became intermediary 
agents whereby the effects of the primal One, the First 
Principle of all things, were conveyed to that world. In a 
word, the Platonic dualism between Thought and Sense, 
Pure Being and Phenomena, was superseded and merged in 

1 Cf. Zeller, Phil. Griech. in. 2, pp. 376, 451, 497. Ueberweg, Hist. Phil. 
1. 247. 

'^ lamblichus placed the Ideas in the lower ' Intellectual ' World, whils 
archetypes of them had a place in the ' Intelligible ' world — a characteristic 
expansion of Plotinus' doctrine that they are immanent in the Nous. Infr, 
p. 68, and cf. Ueberweg, Hist. Phil. i. 248. 

R. E. 5 



66 NEO-PLATONISM. 

a Unity transcending both. So far from asserting the truth 
and absolute existence of thought, this theory accomplished 
the reverse ; for it represented the ground of thought as un- 
cogni sable \ 

Plotinu^. Some ninety years before the birth of Julian there 

had come to Bome a stranger whose worn but philosophic 
garb, whose bright though sunken eye denoted at once the 
genius and the ascetic. The wisdom of Zoroaster, and the 
secret lore of India exercised it was said a strange spell over 
his imagination, but his training had been in the Greek 
philosophy ; he was an adoring pupil of the Alexandrian, 
Ammonius Sakkas, who as an apostate Christian, under 
colour of the faith he had abjured, gave catechetical instruc- 
tion under a veil of Pythagorean secresy in the new doctrines 
he professed. Plotinus, such was the stranger's name, 
opened a school at Rome, and became the Chrysippus'^ of the 
Neo-Platonic philosophy. Disciplined austerity of persoii 
combined with rare acuteness and intensity 'of mind, and a 
philosophic fervour of conviction that bordered upon inspira- 
tion attracted pupils of every grade and temperament : 
emperors and titled dames mingled in his saloon with trained 
philosophers or threadbare students. For many years his 
characteristic and esoteric doctrines remained a secret, un- 
committed to writing and but obscurely hinted in oral 
discourse. At length the representations or feigned attacks 
of favourite pupils, Amelius and Porphyry, induced him to 
systematise his philosophy. The result was the Enneads. 

Aivi and The central aim of Plotinus was to explain and establish 

ys em. ^-j^^ connexion between God, man and the world. To this 
he pertinaciously adhered. He disregarded Physics ; he med- 
dled but little with Logic ; even his Ethics were rigidly 
subordinated to his metaphysical inquiries. Only the 
roughest outline of his system can be here attempted ; that 
is a necessary preface to any understanding of Julian's philo- 
sophical position. 



J Zoller, III. 2, pp. 377, 422. 

- f( fiT] yb.p ijf X.pvannroi ovk etc yjv crrod. 



NEO-PLATONISM. (57 

Spirit and Matter stand at opposite poles. Man in his Spirit and 
twofold nature implies the existence of both, testifies to the * *^*'' 
connexion of the two, and craves after an explanation of that 
connexion. Its nature and its mode are the problems set 
before him. In the Spirit world, such is the answer of 
Plotinus, there exists a triad — the One, Intelligence, and 
Soul. These are not three persons or substances * of a co-equal 
Trinity, but denote three descending orders of Spiritual 
Being. At the summit of all, absolute, unconditioned, The One. 
ineffable and incomprehensible stands the One. Unlike the 
One or the Good of Plato, the One of Plotinus is not an 
Idea, but rather the principle of all Ideas, itself raised above 
the sphere of the Ideas, and transcending all determinations 
of existence, so that neither rest nor motion, not even Being 
or not-Being can be predicated of it. It transcends thought, 
for thought implies a duality ; still less can it be the Good, 
for that admits of a multiplicity of determinations. Its im- 
perfect name, the One, is but an approximate description, 
correct only so far as absolute Oneness excludes the attiibu- 
tion of any but negative predicates. The One is not all 
things, but before all things. Unapproachable by thought, 
it is known only in its effects. In what way all things, 
the Many, were evolved from the One, transcends human 
reason to conceive. It is the overflowing source of essential 
Being, but as such even in emitting energy experiences no 
change, nor is its pre-existent Oneness affected or impaired^ 

From this excess of radiated energy, related to the One, A'^ow>-. 
as the image to the original, the sun to light, proceeded 
Nous or Intelligence. Classed next to the One, towards which 
it constantly turns, it represents the smallest degree of de- 
parture from absolute Oneness and perfection. Thought' and 

^ J. Simon's contention that tliey are (adopted by Lewes in bis Hist, of 
Philos. I. 388 pp.) seems rightly denounced by Zeller as ' eine auffallende 
Verkennung der Plotinischen Lehre.' Cf. note in his Phil, der Grieeh. in. 
2, p. 450. 

2 The activity implied in this absolute and primary causality contains of 
necessity an idea of plurality. Plotinus strove to meet the difficulty by 
regarding it as describing a modification of its rather than of the first cause. 

* But Thought, be it added, abstracted from all thinking ; premiss and 

5—2 



C8 NEO-PLATONIRM. 

Being, the latter being the posterior of the two and definable 
as Thought made stationary, are regarded as its fundamental 
determinations. It is pure spirit still, hampered by none 
of the limitations or imperfections that attend on matter, 
independent of space or time, enjoying a repose which consists 
in equable and unchanging motion, so that its whole being 
is absolute activity. Emanating from the One, this Nous 
becomes in its turn the basis of all existence, for it includes 
as immanent parts of itself all the Ideas. In fact the whole 
sum of Ideas, regarded as a unity, constitutes the N0O9, 
which thus becomes the determininor source of all beinof and 
all thought. The spiritual order which it contains and 
pervades is called the K6a-/jLo<; vorjro'i or Intelligible World. 
From this every element of phenomenal finiteness is absent, 
and it combines in itself the apparent contradictories of 
absolute plurality, as containing perfectly all forms of being, 
and yet of perfect unity, with which it is imbued by the 
primal One. Harmony with this NoO? is the highest goal to 
which the spiritual part of man can attain. 
Sotd. The third factor in the Trinity, Soul, stands in the same 

relation to Nous, as Nous to the One. It is the image or 
reflection of Nous, as the moon's light to the sun's. It too 
belongs still to the order of Spirit, but is as it were on the 
outer fringe of the circle illumined by the central One. Nous 
may be represented by an inner immovable sphere described 
about the great centre of all Being, Soul as an outer mova- 
ble sphere turning about the interior Nous. Spirit has now 
by a series of acts of self- estrangement from its creative 
centre reached the lowest gradation of which it is capable. 
Light has reached the confines of darkness, and potential 
connexion with matter has been secured : by another meta- 
phor Soul is spoken of as extended Nous, which, just as the 
point extended becomes a line, is now brought within touch 
of matter. Thus Soul is made the link between the Many 
and the One, Rest and Motion, Eternity and Time. Into 



consequence being to Nous simultaneous \vitboi;t intervention of tlic th:nk- 
ing process. 



NEO-PLATONISM. 69 

the subtler minutiaa of the double World-Soul, Earth-Soul, 
and Separate Souls, it is needless to enter. The final 
contact with Matter is established by emanative action analo- 
gous to that by which the One passed into Nous and Nous 
into Soul. On the nature of this so-called emanation it be- 
hoves to speak shortly. 

Emanation is only a clumsy mode, imposed by the Emana- 
limitations of human thought and expression, of represent- *""" 
ing a transcendental act or series of acts. It should be called 
rather eternal procession, for it must not be regarded as 
occurring in time at all. The divisions of the triad as just 
described are all alike co-eternal ; so too is matter, and the 
interdependence and relations of all these to each other. 
Further in Neo-Platonic emanation there is no communica- 
tion of being, passing into or calling into existence lower 
intermediary orders : herein it is quite distinct from the 
emanation of Oriental philosophies. The First Cause is in 
essence incommunicable : there is a communication of force 
or effect only, not of being. The One, Nous and Soul are 
in themselves absolutely unaffected by any emanation to 
which they give rise : it does not take place at their expense : 
they are occupied solely with that from which they emanated. 
Emanation is not even produced by any act of volition, 
still less of self-impartition : it takes place by an internal 
and natural necessity, which is a part of the nature of Spirit, 
no more consciously exercised than gravity by a particle. 
Lastly, each act of emanation represents a degradation : Nous 
is lower than the One, and the Soul than Nous, though in its 
proper sphere each is perfect. By such progressive stages of 
imperfection is it alone possible to bridge the illimitable 
gulf between Spirit and Matter. 

With regard to Matter, some substratum appeared to Matter. 
Plotinus a necessary assumption involved by the existence of 
the phenomenal world. This substratum he regards as the 
absolute privation of all being or quality. As such it is 
wholly unthinkable, and can be described by negatives only, 
as formless, indeterminate, unqualified and the like. One 
positive attribute it does appear at first sight to possess. It 



70 NEO-PLATONISM. 

is the cause and origin of all Evil, which cannot by possibility 
be derived from the spiritual nature of the emauative Soul. 
This is explained however by representing Evil as a negative 
quantity, a certain absence or deprivation of Good which 
belongs properly to Matter. Into Matter so conceived Soul 
entering by voluntary emanation produces the phenomenal 
world, almost every degree of intermixture or rather propor- 
tionate prevalence of the elements being provided for by 
gradations descending from angels, dasmons and heroes through 
men to animals and inanimate matter. 
Ecstasy. Of Neo-Platonic anthropology or ethics no analysis need be 

given, but its most original and characteristic tenet demands 
an allusion. Intelligence (j/ou?) the highest rational faculty 
of man might, as in the Platonic scheme, be trained more and 
more to harmony with the supreme Nous. Yet by no con- 
ceivable perfection of mere reason could the finite attain to 
communion with the incomprehensible infinite. The nature of 
the two things forbade it. Reduced by rigorous metaphysi- 
cal reasoning to this result, and yet intuitively assured that 
knowledge of the infinite was within the range of man, 
Plotinus fell back on the doctrine of Ecstasy. Above reason 
and above intelligence man, so he taught, possesses an 
energy kindred to the One whereby he may attain to direct 
communion with it. Leaving thought and spirit behind, 
divesting itself of personality and individual consciousness, 
the soul by an ecstatic elevation of being might enter into 
actual unification or contact {aTrXwaci, d(fy>]) with God, and 
become absorbed in the Infinite Intelligence from which it 
emanated. For that rapturous space 'reminiscence might be 
changed into intuition.' Weaned altogether from the flesh, 
disenthralled of desire and lust, trained to the sincere 
unalloyed contemplation of the divine Ideas, four times in a 
lifetime was Plotinus caught up to the seventh heaven and 
admitted to this transcending and ineffable communion : 
and once, when he was an old man of near seventy, the same 
exalted privilege was vouchsafed to Porphyry \ For this 

' In records of lamblichns the spiritual ecstasy becomes degraded to 
budily levitation. His domestics alleged that dui-ing his orisons he would 



NEO-PLATONISM. 71 

supreme end, this final term of knowledge, the Neo-PIatonist 
was invited to mortify the flesh, to pursue after virtue and 
to purify the soul. Such was his incentive and his reward. 

As regards all forms of religion Plotinus himself had the Popular 
intellectual strength to take a singularly independent atti- 
tude. The spirit of his system was doubtless antagonistic to 
Christianity: that reposed on objective historical facts by 
which it declared God was brought down to man ; while Neo- 
Platonism from a purely subjective basis claimed to enable 
men to rise to God. The analogies that appear between the 
two are more verbal than real. On the other hand, Neo- 
Platonism lent itself readily to current Pagan beliefs : its final 
monotheism left abundant room for any amount of subordinate 
polytheism. This Plotinus admitted without turning aside 
to corroborate or refute details. To him Paganism was an 
amplified and not always trustworthy commentary, which fell 
short of deserving a place in his text. 

Such is a rough outline of Plotinus' solution of the great Plotinus' 
world-problem. It attained its purest and most masculine **^^^**<"'^- 
development in his hands. His successor Porphyrins did 
indeed add details and advance individual arguments a step 
or two further, but was little more than a skilful and trusty 
expositor : such real modification as he did introduce was in 
the direction of co-ordination of Pagan beliefs with Neo- 
Platonic philosophy, and the abandonment of the free posi- 
tion taken by Plotinus towards all extant forms of religion. 
But under lamblichus^ the school entered upon what is justly 
regarded as a new stage. Though overflowing with intel- 
lectual pretentiousness he added nothing of metaphysical or 
ethical value. To him the religious attitude of the philosophy 
became all in all. He caught at numerical formulae of the 
Pythagoreans, and though in that department he discovered 
nothing new and misunderstood much that was old, pro- 
claimed that there lay deep secrets of religion and philosophy. 

be bodily raised to a height of 15 or 18 feet, his flesh and his robes 
assuming meanwhile a golden hue. Eunap. Vit, Soph. larnbl. 

^ Lewes, Hist. Philos. i. 383 seems hasty in writing, 'With Porphyry 
and lamblichus Neo-Platonism becomes a sort of Church.' 



72 NEO-PLATONISM. 

He multiplied Gods ad nauseam: he accumulated insipid 
divisions and subdivisions of spiritual genera. In fact, be 
and tbe Syrian School used to fatal effect the mysticism -which 
Plotinus' own intellect had not always kept in bounds. They 
employed Neo-Platonism as an engine against Christianity, 
as the new and last stronghold of Polytheism. They con- 
verted a school of inquirers into a church of believers. In 
order to this they recklessly degi'aded their philosophy. In 
attempting to popularise they also irremediably vulgarised : 
they depreciated the intellectual side, to expand the mystical 
or theurgic. They exalted Pythagoras and deposed Aristotle', 
lamblichus, foiled in a dialectical discussion, coolly replied 
that the intuitions of virtue were above logic. Julian fell 
into the hands of this school when he was referred by his 
tirst teachers to one who ' for the grandeur and power of his 
natural intellect could discard philosophical demonstration*.* 
In spite of the protests of the aged Porphyry, magic or 
theurgy was made the highest branch of philosophy. ' The 
philosopher' while admitting a true art of augury and divina- 
tion, in a series of sceptical questions and doubts partly 
practical and partly metaphysical, criticised many current 
manifestations of the art as interposing material obstacles 
between man and God, with whom the heart was the one 
true organ of communion and revealer of oracles, and did not 
conceal his perplexity concerning the modes, and causes, and 
tests of divination depending on the strange material 
mediums or adjuncts which were coming into vogue. Thus 
in his Epistle to Anebon, the cygneus cantus of the dying 
sage, he enters his final protest against the new-fangled 
hocus-pocus of priestcraft. But in vain : cabbalistic fatuity, 
fantastic ceremonies, bloody initiative rites, miracles, evoca- 
tion of spirits, theophanies, sorceries, with their accompany- 
ing abominations came crowding in. Superstition and 
philosophy signed an adulterous compact, and were made one 
flesh. The intellectual ingenuity with which lamblichus 



^ Cf. lamblichus' Life of Pythagoras. 
- Euuap. Maximus. 



NEO-PLATONISM. ' 73 

made necromancy and tliaumaturgy the handmaids of philo- 
sophy only wakens a regret that his talents were not better 
employed than in stultifying the learned and imposing on 
the incredulous. 

With the third stage of Neo-Platonism, the acute but 
sterile scholastic period of Proclus, an essay on Julian has no 
concern. 



CHAPTER IV. 



JULIANS THEOLOGY. 

"Li the silent mind of One ail-pure 

At first imagined lay 
Tlie sacred world, and ty procession sure 
From those still deeps, in form and coloixr drest. 
Seasons alternating and night and day, 
The long-nursed thought to north, south, east, and west, 

Took then its all-seen way." 

Julian's The ground is now cleared for examining Julian's scheme 

Theology. ^^ religious revival. The first step in this will be to master 
its intellectual basis, in other words Julian's theology. 

The One. Julian nowhere in his surviving works developes his doc- 

trine concerning the One with any fulness or precision. In 
the incidental allusions which occur, he wavers as to the 
rightful title to be assigned; whether this highest original 
principle is to be regarded as ineffable and to be described 

0/-. 4. 182 CD simply as that which is beyond or transcending I^ous {to 
iTreicecva rod Nov), or as the One, or in Platonic terminology 
as the Good, or lastly as the Idea of all Existences, by which 
he explains himself to mean the Intelligible (rb votjtov) in 
its entirety. So far as he goes, he agrees with Plotinus in 
either assigning to it negative determinations only, or allow- 
ing it by courtesy the imperfect title of the Good, or finally 
treating it positively through the medium of its effects as 
absolute causality. On the exact relation of the One to 
Nous Julian is silent : in the above there seems a tendency 



THEOLOGY. 75 

to confuse the highest Deity with either the first or second 
members of the trinity of Plotinus. On the essential being or. i. 139 b 
of the One Julian is sufficiently orthodox. It transcends all 
human description or conception : it is from eternity pre-sub- 
sistent ; it includes within itself all Being ; its very essence is 
unity. Itself incomprehensible it is the sole unique in- 
composite cause of the whole universe. Julian most fre- i32d,i33b4-c. 
quently denominates it the Good. Itself the crown and 
source of every existence, it enters into transcendental rela- 
tions with the subordinate orders of Being. These are three 
in number, and carefully differentiated by Julian. To dis- 
tinguish them in English, recourse must be had to terms of 
formal philosophy. The first and highest order is styled the 
Intelligible (to voijrov); the second, the Intellectual (to 
voepov); the third, the Cosmic. This strict trinitarian con- 
ception runs through the whole system : the triad involves 
a pantheistic belief, since the lowest member of the trinity 
includes the material world. It is with the first and most 
spiritual alone that the Good has direct communication. In 
that order, in other words in the Intelligible Gods^ it becomes 133 b 
the author of the beauty, the essential being, the perfectness 
and the unity which characterise them. Thus through them 132 d 
it is said to originate in all existences their beauty and 
perfection, their unity and power inexplicable. These In- 
telligible Gods are not generally conceived to issue from 
the supreme One, though such language is in loose usage 
admissible. More strictly they cluster round^ the One, being 
as it were with all creation a part of his ever-emitted ra- 
diance. * He transcends all things, round him are all things, i36 d 
and for his sake all things are.' The One is not so much a 
creator, as an everlasting well of existence : in the case of 
the Intelligible Gods, immediately, elsewhere mediately, by or. 5. lei c 
virtue of essence transmitted to the Intelligible Gods. To cyr. ss 
such demiurgic functions committed to these last, and by 

1 See infr. p. 77. 

2 Of. jSao-X^o, ire pi ov Travra. 'iaTiv. Or. 4. 132 c. r(2v dvXiav Kal vorjrCiv 
Oewv, ol irepl rayadop elcriv. Or. 4. 138 D. The two phrases are combined 
in "HXtos 6 xepl T-ijv rdyadoO yovi./j.ov oialav i^ aiSiov irpoeKOuiv 156 C, show- 
ing emanation to be synonymous with eternal procession. 



76 JULIAN, 

them in turn transmitted to the inferior grades of deities, 
all orders of being are due, until contact is finally attained 
with mortal perishable forms of matter. 
Nature of The Gods, those at any rate of the two higher orders, the 
0;-. 4. 145 A*ff. Intelligible and the Intellectual, are unsubstantial (diiXoi) 
and immaterial {dawfiaToi), Goodness, and that which is 
good, is an inseparable part of their essence, and remains 
142 D, 143 a. ever inherent in their very nature. No duality of nature, 
corresponding to the spiritual and carnal elements in man, 
is conceivable in the Gods. They are not to be regarded as 
non-natural magnified men : for in truth the divine nature 
is radically different from the human. It is indivisible, and 
does not admit the analysis or the modifications to which 
man's nature is liable. The kind of personality which they 
possessed in Julian's eyes is a difficult matter to settle. They 
combined strangely the impersonal nature of the Platonic 
Ideas with the personality attributed to the polytheistic 
deities\ There is a confusion of their persons one with an- 
other, and a necessitarianism attributed to their whole mode 
of being and acting, that converts them into forces rather than 
living wills. Both the limitations and the powers of strict 
personality seem not seldom denied to them. But, on the 
other hand, they are habitually feared, addressed, adored and 
propitiated as though gifted with personal will, and the 
power to put it into effect. With the Gods, will, power, 
action, are one and the same thing, a part of their essence 
142 c D and inseparable. ' Whatsoever a God wills, that he is and 
can and does : he neither wills what he is not, nor is thwarted 
in what he wills, nor is of the mind to do what he cannot.' 
Fra:;.Ep. SOI Good being a constant element of their essence, or rather 
actually constituting their essence, they are in action, whether 
towards one another or towards man, entirely and invariably 
beneficent. This description, though vouchsafed primarily 
of the higher orders of Gods, is applicable also to the lower 
Cosmic Gods — the visible and sensible as contrasted with 
the invisible and spiritual Gods — whose functions will be 

^ Naville, Jul, VApost. pp. 72, 133 sq. 



THEOLOGY. 77 

considered in due course. For to depict their true relations, 
it is essential to treat of the Gods according to their proper 
grades. 

The highest sphere is, as has been repeated, the Intelligi- I'^teiu- 
b]e\ The Intelligible World is characterised by what Julian o,-. i. no a * 
speaks of as an exuberant superabundance of life-producing 
fecundity. As the superfluous energy of the One produced 
the Intelligible World round about the One, so too does it 
in its turn manifest a like exuberance. All that belongs to it 140 c 
enjoys pure, uncontaminated immaterial being; nothing of 
alien nature inheres in it, nor ever has or can approach it 
from without. In attributes of beauty, eternity, absoluteness, 
spirituality, or, if the term be allowed, intellectuality, it cor- 
responds to the Platonic world of Ideas ; it is full of its 
own proper untainted purity. It is peopled by the Intel- 
ligible Gods, and by them alone. 

Essentially the Intelligible Gods exist around the Good, by 139 a 
eternal emanation from him. From the Good they inherit di- 
rect all their gifts and powers ; he supplies them ungrudgingly 133 b 
with beauty, with being, with perfection, with unity, in Neo- 
Platonic language he 'contains' them all, and illuminates 
them with that dyaOoeiS)]^ Svvafii<;, that inherited element 
or faculty of the archetypal Good, in which their majesty 
consists, and which they transmit in measure to subordinate 
orders of being. Among these Intelligible Gods, and highest 
of them all, is ranked Helios, King Sun. 

At this point a digression becomes necessary. One of Julian's 
Julian's surviving works is a kind of devotional rhapsody — Fourth 
addressed to Salustius — in honour of King Sun. The address 
is manifestly an effort of rhetoric rather than a spontaneous 
effusion of devotion I Hastily ^ often confusedly put together, 
and too pretentiously embellished, it yet remains the most 



1 This particular triple arrangement, quite unrecognised by Plotinus, was 
one of the elaborations of lamblichus. 

2 'Partly plagiarised, partly parodied from lamblichus,' says Schlosser 
bluntly. Jenaisehe allg., p. 126. 

3 It was the work of three evenings only (157 c), and covers nearly 
forty pages. 



78 JULIAN. 

fruitful quarry from which to extract Julian's dogmatic 
beliefs. No doubt it exaggerates the functions and pre-emi- 
nence of Sun, or rather throws them out of just proportion 
as compared with those of other deities. Sun, his position 
and his work, arc in the foreground; the rest are aside or 
in the background, jumbled, slurred, and out of focus. But 
from sources quite independent of this elogium, it is plain 
that Julian did elevate King Sun, under one representation 
or another, to the first place among Gods. Neo-Platonism 
hailed from the East, and most grew and flourished there ; 
it became deeply tinged with influences of the Mithras cult 
and various forms of fire-worship, every one of which sprang 

Ci/r. G9BC from, while most still acknowledged, Sun adoration as the 
groundwork of religion\ Julian espoused the worship with 
devotion : it appeared to him instinctive ; it dovetailed with 
his philosophy, no less than it charmed his imagination. King 
Sun was the supreme deity, whom under many various names 
all peoples of the world combined to worship. He Avas the 
most tangible link by which Neo-Platonism gave unity 
to Paganism, rendered Polytheism philosophical, and by 
aid of which, minds like Julian's became reconciled to the 
incongruous superstitions or bizarre confusions of popular 
beliefs. Julian regarded him moreover as in a special sense 
his patron ; and delights to call himself his follower, his liege- 
man, or his devotee ^ 

Its mysti- Exaggeration or displacement of relations it will be easy 
in the main to rectify. More misleading than either is a 
lack of lucidity and inconsistency, the inevitable result of 
a pervading mysticism of tone. If the writer himself was 
mystified, it became his penalty, or perhaps duty, to mystify 
his reader. The action of King Sun in the Intelligible and 
Intellectual spheres has to be spiritually derived from the 
analogous action of the phenomenal Sun in the world of 

1 From the very beginning of the Empire this influence made itself felt. 
Augiistus professed peculiar devotion for Apollo. Aurelian and Heliogabalus 
gave Sun pre-eminence in the Pantheon. Constantine's Solar coins are 
familiar to all. 

'- Or. 4. 130 Bc, 131 d, 157 a, &c. &c., Or. 7. 229 pp. (see Chajter VI.). 
Cap.-!. 33G c, F.ji. 13, 38, 51, &c. <tc. 



cism. 



THEOLOGY. 79 

sense. Julian is at great pains to work out these analogies, 
and contributes both knowledge and ingenuity to the task : 
but he is for ever confounding metaphor with fact, and con- 
verting analogies into modes of action; much in the same 
spirit as when to the Alexandrians he insists upon the alter- Ep. 51 
nations of summer and winter, the blessings of sunlight and 
growth of plants, as evidences of the existence of Serapis 
(the Sun God), constituting in his behalf a claim to adora- 
tion. At times he seems purposely to confuse phenomenal 
action with its spiritual counterpart, and throughout leaves 
a vast deal to be interpreted by the spiritual intuitions of 
the reader. Happily, a large residuum of solid information 
is left. 

King Sun himself, most frequently entitled ' King of the King Sun. 
Universe V is himself primarily one of the Intelligible Gods, 1 
and chiefest among them all. He is the immediate and br. 4. 132 c, 
trueborn offspring of the Good, emanating by eternal proces- uq b 
sion from the One, or as it is elsewhere phrased, ' around the isc c 
fruitful essence of the Good.' ' By virtue of its abiding and 
initiative essence the Good produced from its own being and 132 d 
in all things like itself Sun the most high God.' This ema- 
native production must not be looked upon as an act of crea- 
tion, or as realised in time. To every Neo-Platonic deity, 
and to Sun if any, belongs eternal procession : he ' subsisted 133 b 
from Eternity around the abiding essence of the Good,' and 
thus is legitimately spoken of more than once as self-subsis- 139 d 
tent {av6v'Tr6araTo<i). 

Among the Intelligible Gods, or as they are sometimes Sun and 
styled, Intelligible Ideas {elhrj), he not only himself shines ^teiiiqihle 
with pure uncontaminated radiance, but primus inter pares, Gods. 
as incapable of admixture or impurity as light in the sensi- i4o d 
ble world, holds predominance. He is the centre of the In- 
telligible system ; he almost usurps functions which are 
elsewhere attributed to the One ; at any rate, his action 
begins at the point where the direct activity of the One 
ceases; to his centrality is imputed the emanative multi- i39a 

^ 6 /3a(7tWs rwc oXuv. Cf. e.g. Or. 4. 145 c, 146 a, 149 d, 154 d, 15G c, 
158 B. 



80 JULIAN. 

plication of the divine Intelligible essence, which without 
thereby receiving diminution or increase or any kind of 
affection gives rise to the Intellectual order of existences. 
Hh posi- It is not a little curious that in more than one passage* 

Gods"^'^^^ Julian speaks of Sun apparently as one of the Intellectual 
Gods. His language, taken alone, hardly admits another 
interpretation. Yet that Sun's position is such as has been 
just described is undeniable. The fact is, that Julian has 
three separate Suns, or phases of Sun in his mind, and is 
Or. 4. 133 c not Sufficiently precise in distinguishing them. In the actual 
passage where he alludes to this tripleness, he makes it per- 
fectly clear that the third Sun is the phenomenal Sun : as 
for the two others, he leaves the reader in obscurity^ Both 
from the immediate context however and from the whole 
oration the obvious interpretation is, that the first Sun is 
King Sun himself, the Intelligible Deity, whose harmonizing 
office in his own sphere almost intrudes upon that of the 
Good itself; while the second Sun is the Sun regarded in 
his action on the Intellectual sphere. This forms the subject 
of whole pages of the treatise, and it is his sovereignty and 
most intimate action among the Intellectual Gods of which 
Julian is thinking, when he loosely classes Sun as one of 
them rather than one above them. 
rnihj of Each of the three orders. Intelligible, Intellectual and Cos- 

llai Orders ^^^' ^'^J'^y^ perfection after its own kind. In the Intelligible 
139 B c World there is a pervading unity, the gift of the One, which 
Intciii. contains, conjoins or confederates the whole into a One or 
World. perfect harmony. This unifying principle in the Intelligible 
World is analogous to that Quintessence or Fifth Substance, 
which, in constant motion round and round the heaven, by 
virtue of such periphery contains and welds together all the 

1 Cf. Or. 4. 132 D, 141 d— 142 a. Zeller, ni. 2, p. 629, admitting the un- 
certainty, speaks of Sun as belonging relatively to the first order, but 
positively (comparing hints from lamblichus) to the second triad of In- 
tellectual Gods. 

'^ Obscurity such that I suspect a lacuna or misreading of some kind in 
the preceding lines. I have not been able to consult M. Tourlet's un- 
successful elucidation of the matter, to which De Broglie refers L'Eglise, iv. 
p. 129 11. Sciiiisch, pp. 20, 30, stops short where the difjficulties begin. 



THEOLOGY. 81 

parts of the Cosmic order, and forbids separation or dissolu- 
tion. The corresponding harmony that rules the Intellectual 
World, is the immediate work of Sun, whose energies in that 
sphere are as all-important as those of the Good in the higher 
sphere, or of the visible Sun in the lower. This is the place 
to examine these in detail. 

First then the Intellectual Gods were derived from Sun Grades of 
essentially. To Neo-Platonist thought the one mode of 
origination was eternal emanation. But em?mation was car- 
ried on by successive stages. At the head of all being, the 
one original Demiurge, from whom every entity and essence or. i. uo a 
is primarily derived, stands the One or the Good. He be- 
comes immediately the principle or first cause of the whole 
Intelligible order. From that point his demiurgic work is 
carried on mediately. Later refinements of Neo-Platonic 
theology subtilised the demiurgic succession into a series of 
triads, each issuing from a monad. Phanes was selected in 
the Intelligible triad^ as the term from which emanated 
the Intellectual triad, Kronos Rhea and Zeus^ From Zeus 
issues the supramundane triad : at the .extremity of which 
comes Apollo, who produces a triad of so-called liberated 
gods (deol airoX.VTOi). Their extreme becomes the generative 
monad of a triad of mundane gods. Julian nowhere endorses 
in detail these refinements ; he retails, by his own confession, iso c, 157 o. 
but 'few out of many ' of the inventions of the divine lambli- 
chus: in his classification of Gods there are marked divergen- 
cies ; but the general principle is strongly asseverated. 

King Sun, the arch-demiurge in the Intelligible World, Sun and 
plays towards the Intellectual the same part that in the lectuai 

^ In a different terminology lambliclaits denotes the liigliest Intelligible 
triad, as Father, Power, and Mind (NoOs). His most symmetrical arrangement 
provided three trinities for the Intelligible, and three for the Intellectual 
order, and he appears to have extended a like classification to a lower 
psychical order. The twelve superior Gods are thus tripled into thirty-six, 
which are in turn multiplied to 360, and also by duplication branch into 
the seventy-two orders of lower Gods. Cf. Jul. Or. 4. 148 c, and specific 
references in ProM. on Tim. 299 d e. Theodorus of Asine had the courage 
to enlarge still further. For this and like flimsy theosophy, see Zeller, Phil. 
der Griech. iii. 2. 620 pp. 

' Cf. Taylor's Pref. to lamblichus On Mysteries, p. vii. 

R. E. .6 



82 JULIAN. 

higher sphere is played by the Good, who there causes and 
Or. 4. 133 c directs all things aright in accordance with presiding in- 
Origina- telligence or NoO?. Thus, though metaphysically the Intel- 
tivei)oiv^i\ lectual Gods share original co-procession and co-subsistence 
with Sun, they are yet said to owe their being to him. This 
means that without his agency their being would never 
145 A B be realised. He supplies them, and in constant unfailing 
measure, with what to the Intellectual God is the very con- 
dition of being, viz. to voelv and voetaOai. Without this 
active and apprehended intelligence, their existence is but 
potential ; they are as eye-sight without light. Nor does his 
Regulative task end here with this creation, or more strictly actualisation 
powei. ^£ their essential being and attributes. Having received 
133 B, 135 A. from the Good dominion among the Intellectual Gods, he 
actively and incessantly exercises it: they are as subordinate 
135 B and inferior to him as the stars are to the natural sun ; 
their whole being is directed by his providing guidance. 
143 CD It is Sun that imparts its unity to all Intellectual being 
throughout the universe. In technical phraseology he * con- 
166 D, 157 A. tains them intellectually ' in himself, fills all heaven with 
them, and himself becomes a unifying centre about which 
their action is harmonised. He may be called a harmonic 
mean or centre {fieaov); not (Julian is careful to explain) 
138 D as a mean between extremes, but as a central principle 
everywhere infusing unity of action, perfecting and har- 
monising diverse energies, and combining otherwise con- 
flicting extremes into a single identity. Like the pheno- 
143c, 138c. menal Sun he controls, adjusts and regulates the centrifugal 

forces of the system. 

Distribu- In addition to his originative and regulative functions, 

ive power. -^^ exercises distributive powers on a royal scale. He is 

directly commissioned to dispense to all Intellectual forms 

144 D, 149 a. of being the rich endowments of perfectness and beauty, 

133 Bc which the Good originates and imparts among the Intel- 

151ab,i56d. ligible Gods. Being, unity, illimitable beauty, productive 

fecundity, perfected intelligence, all the divine attributes 

Analogy to proceed from great Sun. His counterpart or image [elKociv) 

nai'sun.' ^^ ^^^ visible world acts imitatively as a revealing medium 



THEOLOGY. ' 83 

whereby men may adore and understand the analogous work o>: i. 139 d 
of sovereign Sun in the Intellectual order. Just as the 
phenomenal Sun imprints harmony upon the visible uni- 133 c 
verse, of which he forms the centre, as he regulates the 145 c d 
concentric motions of the spheres, guides the circling orbits iss a b 
of the planets at measured distances, and no less the change- 152 c 
ful phases of the moon, as with creative energy he ministers 
to earth her unbroken power of being, as he gives the beauty iss a 
of day for work, and in turn the terror of night wherein men 134 D-135 a 
rest from their labours, as he brings to pass storm and wind 153 c 
and cloud and all atmospheric changes, so does the royal isi D-152 a 
Sun act in the Intellectual world. The sincere uncon- iss d, 140 d. 
taminated radiance of light, which Sun ever sheds abroad 
in this world, which gives sight to the eyes as the artist 
gives form to the marble, is but the counterpart of that 131 cd 
undefiled illuminating Truth in which he bathes the Intel- 
lectual forms of being. Light is to the visible as Truth to 133 a 
the Intelligible. 

Thus King Sun originates, impels and harmoniously ad- Sun's 

^ ^ . -.1 • , 11 J ministers. 

justs, endows and equips with appropriate excellences and 

energies. He continues too to exercise a providing control. 
But he is often mythologically represented as performing 135 a b 
this by deputy. Thus he is said, having controlled the gods 
to a single unity, to hand them over as a mighty army to 
Athene Pronoia to do at her bidding their appointed work. 149 a b 
She acts as his subordinate consort. Elsewhere his guiding 
control finds a different personification as Prometheia^, identi- 
fied with the Mother of the Gods, and constantly in concert 
with the higher deity assuming preservative direction of 
the Intellectual Gods. 

Sun's influence does not end with the Intellectual sphere, The Cos- 
and pass from thence by transmitted emanation only into the 
Cosmic order. He exercises a direct palpable influence over 
the Kosmos. His demiurgic power is active there. He is iss b 
said to have called the Kosmos into being, reserving for his 
representative the central place, so as to secure ready and 
equal distribution of goods and ordering of the heavenly i46 c 
1 With Or. 4. 135 ab, cf. Or. 5. 166 b, 170 d. 

. 6—2 



84 JULiA^r. 

bodies, the subordinate co-proceeding Gods. His demiurgic 
action in the Kosmos occupies a central place between that 
Or. i. 140 A of the primal demiurge and the numerous lower demiurgic 
deities: but no delimitation is attempted of the provinces 
in which each acts. Relatively to the Kosmos these inferior 
creative agencies exhibit themselves in diverse and multi- 
143d, plied activities; relatively to Sun they are uniform, 'crowning 
the uncoutaminated essence of the deity.' In regard to the 
origination of the Kosmos one warning deserves repetition. 
Its creation is not a chronological event. It might appear 
such in the bold representations of Plato and lamblichus. 
It is convenient to describe it so ; indeed hardly possible to 
do otherwise. But the strict theological conception is that 
things proceeded or rather were produced from eternity. 
Sun procreated things visible from the invisible in the 
Or. 5. 171 c infinite present, by the ineffable celerity and unsurpassed 
power of the divine will. 
King Sitn Beyond this point it is hard to push with precision any 
mic Suri account of the functions of King Sun. They mingle inex- 
tricably with those of his mundane representative. Julian 
is so busy with tracing affinities, with extorting spiritual 
correspondences from scientific analyses of the nature and 
uses of light, with wresting astronomical arrangements and 
speculations into allegorical representations of higher truth \ 
and so often veils the transition from the sign to the thing 
signified under an ambiguous 'Sun,' that it is impossible 
without arbitrariness to decide whether the agency of the 
^''■*'i6iD higher or the lower deity is intended. Sun, for instance, is 
described as being with man the joint and universal begetter 
of men : he gathers souls from himself and from other Gods, 
and sows them on earth: in life he ministers to them every 
good, he judges, he directs, he purges them ; finally, he 
liberates them from their bodily tenement, reunites them 
to the kindred and divine essences, converting the ethereal 

1 From Porphyrins onwards Neo-Platonists strangely mixed physical 
and metaphysical speculations. According to Porphyrins SonI before its en- 
trance on earthly existence inhabited the sphere of the fixed stars, ajid made 
its descent to earth via that of the seven planets. 



THEOLOGY. 85 

activity of his divine rays into a vehicle for their convey- 
ance. These might seem duties worthily ascribed to the 
sovereign Sun ; yet are almost unmistakeably transferred to 
his lower representative. Can any other interpretation be 
placed on these words : 'Just as Sun is author of day and Ep. 77. 
night, and of winter or summer by his approach or retro- 
cession, so is he most venerable of the Gods ; to him are all 
things and of him are all things ; he appoints us rulers 
during life, and after death apportions us governors'? Julian 
is either enhancing the dignity of the cosmic Sun, or pur- 
posely giving him the advantage of his name and confounding 
him with his better. 

It would be tedious to rehearse all Julian's praises of the Phemme- 
Sun apparent. He is leader and lord in the sensible world. or.V isi'b 
He is the originative cause of heaven and the stars, and 
upholds them with sustaining force. His vast productive, m c, 142 b. 
fertilising power is dwelt upon persistently. He supplies uo b, O;-. 5. 
a never-ceasing stimulus of life to the earth by alternate or. l 137 d- 

° . _ '' 138 A 

approach and retirement. He enriches men with equable 
unceasing distribution of blessings, material and spiritual. 141 a 
The simplicity of his motion betokens the excellence and iss a b 
superiority of his power beyond that of all planets and stars 
and heavenly bodies. His appearance, his position, his work, 
his action upon natural phenomena proclaim his majesty. 

This is the barest outline of Sun's specific work : but it ^^o^^^^o- 
will be more instructive to view the Kosmos as a whole, and 
range its different parts according to their proper dignity. 
' The divine and all lovely universe from the highest arc of 132 c, 145 ». 
heaven to the utmost ends of earth is from everlasting to 
everlasting.' 'It is a single animate whole, everywhere in- 
stinct with SouP and Intellect, perfect and of perfect parts.' 139 b 
It is not the immediate work of the great First Cause, but cyr. ss 

1 This Neo-Platonic anima mundi differs materially from the Stoic con- 
ception, as has been noticed p. 65. The soul does not physically or me- 
chanically inhere in the body it animates, but dynamically, supplying a 
certain force or effect, in the same kind of way as warm air feels the dynamic 
effect of fire without any inherence of the heat-producing agent. Of. Zeller, 
III. 2. 519 pp. It is according to Plotinus an innate inclination of the 
inferior generated product towards the generative power. Zeller, 585 pp. 



8G JULIAN. 

of those Intelligible Gods to whom he has committed his 
Or. 4.145 D Demiurgic Functions. Its origin is emanative, and it sub- 
sists aro(t»cZ the supreme God Helios or Sun. It is ruled 
directly by the so-called visible or apparent Gods, of whom 
phenomenal Sun is the chief. Moon, planets, stars are all 
oj-.ViibD such apparent Gods, emanating from primal Sun, and coun- 
terparts in the Cosmic sphere of the Intelligible Gods corre- 
sponding to them in the higher order. Between the supra- 
mundane and mundane Gods Julian draws no plain line of 
demarcation. 
Demon- Immediately beneath the Gods come the so-called 'divine 

i4ib'^i45c. kinds' of being. These ubiquitous spirits exercise super- 
or. 7.' 233 o humau agencies, and are distributed in various classes. Angels, 
Daemons, Heroes and Separate Souls. The precise differentia 
of dsemons, heroes and souls respectively had been one of 
Porphyry's^ perjolexities, and Julian does not emulate the 
extravagances of lamblichus by any scientific analysis. He 
teaches in general terms that all alike owe their innate 
energy to Sun. Of Angels there are various classes ; the 
Or. 4. 141 B, highest are Solar Angels {ffkiaKol ayyeXoi,), who are the first 
creation of Sun about the Kosmos : there are also Lunar 
adAth.275B. Augels. One at least of their functions is to act as guardian 
spirits^ The Daemons too are active agents of the Gods.) 
Porphyry^ had assigned to them superintendence over dis- 
tinct animal or vegetable or meteorological departments of 
nature; had honoured them as patrons of particular arts, and 
commissioned ambassadors between Gods and men. But 
they are of uncertain character : exceptional daemons may, 
be altogether beneficent, but as a rule the dsemon is notl 

^ Ad Aneh. with which cf. the answer as touching these points in the 
tract Trepl fxvcTTijpiuv, i. 5 — 7, 20, ii. 1 — 3, 5, &c. 

2 The doctrine of guardian spirits was hard pressed hy some Neo-Platon- 
ists, who beheved in separate dgemons presiding over the different parts and 
functions of the body, though in subordination to a central controlling 
daemon. 

3 Ad Aneh. 10. 16. According to Plotinus they combined divine and 
material attributes. Their body was composed of ' Intelligible Matter ' 
(Zeller, 604 pp.); they could also manifest themselves as luminous bodies ; they 
possessed affections, sensibility, memory and even language. For further 
peculiarities, cf. Zeller, pp. 510, 511. 



THEOLOGY. 87 

absolutely pure or perfectly good, like tlie Gods, but par- Ep. 69. 445 b 
ticipates in some alloy of evil : some are no better than imps 
or bogies. Daemons of distinct characters preside over 
nations, acting under the superintendence of the patron God, 
and helping to mould and perpetuate their national charac- 
teristics. Conversely there is an appointed tribe of malicious 
daemons^ who, guarding the honour of the eternal and sav- 
ing Gods, delude the apostate Christians with dreams of 
heaven after death, or drive them out as anchorites into the 
wildernesses far from their fellow-men. The fxepiaral ylrvxcti 
or Separate Souls^ are products or effects of the great central 
Soul, which pervades the All. Though in contact with mat- 
ter temporarily individualised, they are yet one and the same, 
just as Knowledge or Light though divisible into parts remain 
nevertheless essentially wholes. So the Soul of the Universe 
remains indivisible, though each individual soul derives from 
it its proper complement, when it accepts the self-imposed 
limitations of time, space, and quasi-personality involved in 
the combination with matter. 

At this stage the world of matter is reached. Matter, in Material 
Julian's belief, is eternal, subsisting beside the procreative 
essence of the Gods, and generated by eternal co-procession or. 5. m c d 
with the Gods, by virtue of that superfluous energy of pro- 
creative and constructive powers, with which the Gods, no 
less than the First Cause himself, are endowed. Matter in 
its raw form consists only of negations ; it is the substratum 
void of all attributes and incomprehensible to sense : it is 
utterly lifeless and sterile, the filth, the refuse, the dregs of 
existence ; no language can be too strong to express its 
demerits. Potential determination of being is the sole attri- 
bute allowed to what is in itself ' the absolutely non-existent.' 
It requires to be animated by divine essence before it is o?-.5.i61d^. 
raised to that degree of passible being, in which we appre- 
hend it by sense. It then becomes materialised form {evvkov 

^ Frag. Ep. 288 a b, with wlaich the views of Porph. De Abst. 11. 40 — 42 
may be compared. Cf. Aug. Civ. Dei, x. 9. 

3 Or. 4. 151 c. Compare Zeller, Phil, der Griech. ni. 2. 481, 484 pp. 
and 509, which set forth the correspondence between the views of Plotinus 
and Porphyry, 



88 JULIAN. 

eISo9). Thus the material world conf?ists of so many junc- 
tions of matter with immaterial cause, which confers on it 
sensible being. Matter and spirit alike are primary and 
necessary assumptions ; the union of the two is inexplicable ; 
neither the mode nor agent of the combination is discover- 
able : we only see the result. Some cause of the union there 
must of course have been. That it was not blind chance we 

Or. 5. 162 A may rest satisfied. Any Epicurean theory of fortuitousness 
may be dismissed at the bare mention. Peripatetics attri- 
bute the conjunction to the action ol" the Qidntum Genus or 
Fifth element. But this merely pushes the difficulty a step 
back, not solving it. The earth is supported on the elephant, 
the elephant on the tortoise, and the tortoise — on what ? It 
remains a final fact that soul is united with various forms of 
material being. The mode or cause of union transcends 
reason. It is best regarded not as an act of free-will on the 
part of animating soul, but as necessarily arising from the 
natural constitution of things\ Soul in a figure lying on the 
outskirts of the supra-sensual world could not but illuminate 
the darkness on which it bordered, formless matter, and 
thereby brought into being before all time the phenomenal 
world. The only reasonable explanation of the final dualism 
that everywhere meets the philosopher is offered by the Neo- 
Platonic scheme of eternally existent spirit and eternally ex- 
istent matter connected by emanative processes. The union 

Or. 5. 171 B is brought about solely for the improvement and elevation of 
matter. Much as it may have to endure in the union, soul 

Or. 2. 69 b, the superior nature, akin to God, can take no hurt or hin- 
drance from contact with its baser companion. If cause and 

Or. 4. 141a effect be traced so far back it is thanks to Sun that the 
ideas enter into combination with the vXr) : it is his co- 
operating energy alone that prevents the dissipation of the 
Ideas when they have ventured on the contact. The co- 
herence of the combination is due to his unifying power. 

Cybeie But a nearer insight into the stage, so to speak, at which 

Muth!^^'^^ the connexion was divinely consummated is granted to us in 
the myth of Attis^ Therein it is recounted how Attis ex- 

1 Zeller, Phil, cler Grieclu in. 2. 491 pp., 513 pp. 

2 Jul. Or. 5. 165 B ff. Cf. Ovid Fast. iv. 221 vv. 



THEOLOGY. 89 

posed beside the eddies of the Gallus grew to the perfect 
flower of beauty; how the mother of the Gods conceived a 
passion for him, loaded him with gifts and crowned him with 
stars; how afterwards false to that love he went down into 
the cave and had intercourse with the nymph; whereupon 
followed his mutilation, and the visitation with madness. In 
this pregnant myth the initiated will discern the true ac- 
count of the union between spirit and matter, and the origi- 
nation of the material world. 

The Mother of the Gods is the faithful handmaid of King its Inter- 
Helios. She personifies his providing control. ' As such she P'''^*"^"^"- 
directs and preserves the lower orders of Gods. She dis- 
penses to them Sun's gifts, among others the prime gift of 
demiurgic power, which she at once stimulates and guides. 
Of this there are various grades corresponding to the grades 
of Gods. Attis represents the lowest stage of demiurgic 
productiveness, that namely at which the divine comes in 
contact with the material. He is the last link in the chain i61d,i62a. 
which unites earth with the superabundant fertility of the 
productive principle. The Gallus beside which Attis lay 
blooming is the ya\a^La<i or Milky Way, which is confessedly i65c,i7i a. 
the junction of passible substance with the impassible Quint- 
essence. The Mother's love, her gifts, the crown of stars 
show her at her proper work, elevating, stimulating, ethereal- 166 c 
isiug the demiurgic force and desire of the lower God, so as 
to win it and wean it from its perilous inclination towards 
matter. Spite of that preserving love Attis goes down into i^s d, in a. 
the cave, forsaking heaven for earth, and impregnates the 
nymph, who typifies the immaterial cause which converts 
matter into material being. Such declension from divine 
continence might argue Attis less than divine. He has beea les a 
called a demigod. But in reality it was a gracious, generous 
condescension, a sacrifice for the sake of outcast matter. His itib 
end achieved he returns to heaven. His emasculation has a 
most real meaning. It signifies the restraint of his infinite 
productive power, in other words the fact that in the material 
world generation is limited by the demiureic Providence to icth, itid, 

° "^ '^ lion. 

definite forms. So too has his ensuing madness. The gene- 



90 JULIAN. 

rative cause at the last stage, where the divine is brought 
Or. 5.167b into contact Avith matter, loses self-control: that is to say, the 
material world is not self-subsistent, but subject to never- 
ceasing change and decay. 
Connprva- Such, temporally depicted, is the origination of the mate- 
tion ot the j,-g^| world. The combination remains ever active : otherwise 

Material 

World. every organism (acofxa) ^ matter that is to say informed with 

Or. 4. 137 D spirit, being neither uncreate nor self-subsistent, would revert 
to abstract indeterminate matter {v\r}). Its whole Being is 
but Becoming; in other words life depends on constant 
change of conditions, the means towards which is supplied 
from without. There is need of constant, outward sustain- 

132 c, 137 c. ment, or as the Neo-Platonists prefer to say containment, by 
divine power. Primarily this must be conferred by the 
action of the sovereign One, secondarily by the Intelligible 
order, but immediately the world is preserved or contained 
by nothing else than that 'fifth substance' or Quintessence, 
of which the principal component is the sun's ray. This 
pericosmic Quintessence, not seldom spoken of as the cyclic 
139 c substance, is incessantly busy at the borders of the universe 
coercing and welding together all the naturally dispersive 

Or. 5. 170 c elements. It belongs to the divine impassible portion of 

being, being that part of it which comes in contact with 

lower passible existences. The Milky Way marks the border 

171 A line, where the creative reign of the higher Gods ends, and 

that of Attis commences. 

The Quintessence conserves being : it is not said to origi- 
nate it. This function is constantly attributed to Sun. The 

Or. 4. 137 D, necessary influx and efflux of Being, which is essential to an 

138 a. . "^. . _ °' 

active existence, is provided by his ordered approach and re- 
tirement. To take a specific instance man is, as Aristotle^ 
131 c, 151 D. says, the offspring of man and of Sun, the former transmit- 
ting the mortal material element, the latter providing for the 
indwelling presence of Soul. The procreative Gods produced 
Frn,n. Ep. man, having from the beginning received souls from the 

1 To the Neo-Platonist all phenomenal matter consists necessarily of 
ffiifxara: for use of word of. Or. 6. 182 d, 

2 Ar. Phys. ii. 2, p. 194 b. 



THEOLOGY. 91 

prime Demiurge. As to the act of creation, while admitting 
as an alternative the Scripture account, he prefers to believe Frag. Ep. 
that numerous couples and not one merely were created. It 
would have been as easy to create many as one, and the dis- 
tinctive characteristics of race, features, laws, customs, and 
the like, no less than the vast numbers existing, point de- 291 d— 292 c. 
cidedly to the former as the true hypothesis. And not the 
nobler parts of the Universe alone, not man or the celestial 
bodies only, but every stick or stone is animate with its pro- 8ooa 
per complement of soul, without which it would be mere 
formless undetermined matter. At the same time the nature 
of the soul animating man, living creatures, plants and inani- 
mate matter differs^ with the respective differences of the 
body animated. Inanimate objects possess qualities only, 
plants a living organism, animals soul, man a reasonable soul : 
though it is a grave question whether the superiority is not i^ic.'^^^^' 
one of energy rather than of essential kind. 

As a brief summary of what may be called Julian's doc- ^^cir^7^a^ 
trinal theology, the grand ascription of praise which closes 
his Hymn to the Sun deserves quotation. There he ad- or.i.i56csq. 
dresses him as 'before all Gods Sun himself, monarch of the 
Universe, Who proceedeth from everlasting around the pro- 
creative essence of The Good, midmost and in the midst of 
the Intellectual Gods, Who before time was fulfilleth them 
with cohesion^ and infinite beauty and procreative abundance 
and perfect intellect and all good gifts together. Who in time 
present radiateth light from everlasting into His visible and 
proper seat that hath its course in the midst of the whole 
heaven, Who imparteth of the intelligible beauty to all the 
Universe, Who fulfilleth the whole heaven with all those 
Gods whom He Himself intellectually containeth within 
Himself, multiplying around Him in indivisible fellowship 
and joined to Him in single unity, Who not less containeth 
also the sublunar space by perpetual generation and the good 
gifts ministered from His cyclic frame. Who careth for the 

1 Or. 6. 182 D, to whicli Plot. Sent. 10 gives a useful parallel. Cf. also 
Zeller, iii. 2, p. 590. 



92 JULIAN. 

whole common race of men and for Rome our city in peculiar 
Avise, even as He hath supplied' the substance of my soul 
that is from everlasting, and hath made me His own 
devotee.' 

Vieto of ItAvill now bccome plain at once that Julian did not 

Nuho'^ decompose the Hellenic mythology into representations of 
lo(ji). nature worship, detecting in its tales so many transformed 

and fossilised solar myths. For this he had not the mate- 
rials with which Sanskrit and Zend mythology have supplied 
moderns. An extract from Cyril's work will furnish the 
most compact summary of Julian's doctrine concerning the 
popular divinities. 'The Demiurge is common father and 
cyr. 115 D E king of all, but he hath moreover assigned all peoples to 
Gods presiding over peoples and caring for commonwealths, 
each of whom governs his allotment conformably to his own 
nature. For seeing that in the Father all things are perfect 
and all one, while in the separate deities one or another 
quality predominates, therefore is it that Ares presides over 
the bellicose, Athene over them that combine wisdom with 
war, Hermes over them that are shrewd rather than adven- 
turous, and the nations over which they preside follow each 
the several natures of their proper Gods.' The language 
here is plain; a fuller personality than usual is accorded, 
and in itself the passage seems clear of ambiguities. But 
one question remains. Into what part of this theology were 
the current Pagan Gods fitted? 

How far the Gods themselves, like the stories of Homer 
concerning them, are mythical, and do but adumbrate the 
Divine essences with which popular theology confounds 
them, it is difficult to determine. The question indeed at 
this point becomes one of terms: in short are the names 
assigned true names or misnomers? The answer is that 
the names are of human invention, the beings denoted are 
real. With very few exceptions they take rank among the 
Intellectual Gods^ as subordinate helpers of King Sun. But 

^ iiricTT-qcrep. 

2 Thus the real object of adoratiou becomes the second member — person 



1 



THEOLOGY. 93 

it would be a vain hope to search Julian's pages for a consis- 
tent account of their respective relations, functions and 
priority. He is too enamoured of arbitrary allegorising from 
Homeric genealogies, of subtle inferences from oracular verses, 
and of mystic interpretations of popular myths, to adhere to 
any plain uniform classification of deities. Their relations 
to King Sun are as determinate as anything, and offer the 
best standard of comparison. 

Zeus is the highest God. In order to accommodate Hel- The Hel- 
lenic beliefs and revelations^ to the Neo-Platonic theology, 
he is placed usually on an exact equality with Sun, though 
here and there slight traces of inferiority are permitted to or. 7. 232 c 
appear. It is only in casual adjuration that great Sun is Ep. zs. iu a. 
allowed to stand second. Most commonly the two are iden- or i.mA, 

•^ 143 D, 144 A c, 

tified as sharing single coequal sovereignty over the whole o'jf^^flig 
tribe of Intellectual Gods. The identification is actually ^^^ ^ ^■ 
justified by a Homeric genealogy^. To both alike is given ^J. a." 
the title 'Father of the Gods.' Incidentally Serapis is 
identified with Zeus or Sun, mainly on the strength of an Cacs. 310 d 
oracular verse; he is elsewhere spoken of as the brother of 
Zeus. The only other God elevated to such rank is Hades. 
He too must thank the oracle for his representation as the 
gentle propitious deity' whose kindly hand dissolves that 

we cannot say— of Julian's main triad. But I cannot follow Lamd, 235 pp., 
and Naville (cf. p. 104) in supposing any intentional imitation of Christian 
theology, or a desire to provide popular adoration with an object of worship 
analogous to the Son, or the "Word proceeding from the Father. The 
analogy is far too latent and obscured to have had that practical aim, though 
subsequently the Manichean exponents of Magianism, in their futile en- 
deavour to engraft their own creed on Christianity, identified Christ, regarded 
as the Logos, with the vivifying power of Sun. (Cf. Aug. contra Faust, xx. 2.) 
The subject is touched and Baur quoted in Hilgenfeld's Zeitsch. filr wiss. 
Theol. 1861, p. 411. Herwerden's theory (p. 76), adopted by Naville, p. 114, 
of a comparison between Asldepius— engendered by God, and made manifest 
on earth as the universal Saviour of men (cf . Or. 4. 144 c, 153 b, Cyril, 200 A b) 

and Jesus, appears to me no less fallacious. Lam^ preceded Naville with 

like elaborated analogies : the task proved comparatively easy, after that 
' pour la theologie heUenique, nous avons montr6 qu'eUe etait identique a la 
thtlologie chr^tienne.' 

1 Through Homer and others. ^ See infr. p. 97. 

3 Or. 4. 136 A, 153 J3. Cf. Plat. CratyL xs. p. 403. 



94) JULIAN. 

union between soul and matter, wliich it is the reciprocal 
work of Sun to bring to pass. Tlie Muses follow him as the 

Or. 4.152 D, leader of their choir, while Dionysus is the son and con.sortto 
Cues. 33ti c whom Sun appoints his proper work. Horus and Mithras 
are other names for Sun rather than coequal deities. None 
other can claim a place among Intelligible Gods unless it be 
Apollo. His identification with Sun can be only of a popular 
character, but as consort with him he takes unsurpassed 

0,-. 4. 144 A- rank, partaking of the same simplicity of intelligence, the 
same stability of being, the same immutability of energy as 
Sun himself. It is he who in joint ascendancy instructs 
152D&C. men by oracles, inspires them with wisdom, and adorns 
societies with religions, constitutions, laws and civilisation. 
The other Gods are definitely inferior to Sun, and assist in 
special departments of his wide range of activities, personify- 
ing as it were those activities. None transcend in dignity 
Or. 5. 179 A Athene and the Mother of the Gods, between whom there is a 
clear affinity. Each represents Sun's controlling Providence: 
each may be spoken of as his consort, and acts in full com- 
munion with the Intelligible Gods^. The Athene myth 
stereotypes anthropomorphically the direct emanation of 
Athene from Sun or Zeus, and does not conceal her inferi- 
ority. Justice has been already done to their controlling, 
preservative custodianship of forces imparted to the Intel- 

or. i. 149 A, lectual Gods. Athene is moreover the wisest of sfoddesses. 

154 D. . . , . & ' 

Of 5 166 a- and virtue and wisdom and contrivance and statesmanship 

C, li9 D, &c. I: 

adAth.269D ^^e amoug her bounties to men. Aphrodite too consorts with 

153 b; 154 a! Sun, as a busy handmaid in his service. Among the heaven- 

150 Bc ly Gods she acts as a combining principle; she is the concord 

and unity of their harmony, and goes everywhere with Sun 

tempering his creative work. On earth she sheds forth rays 

of purest loveliness, brighter than very gold, melting men's 

153 b souls with delight, and becoming to all living things the 

principle of generation and the source of self-renewing life. 

i44a-c,i52c. Dionysus represents and shares the disseminative productive 

power of Sun, and is a loyal fellow-worker and ruler, whom 

1 Or. 4. 145 c, Or. 5. 170 d, 179 d, with which cf. Or. 6. 182 c, Or. 7. 230 A. 



THEOLOGY. 95 

Sun regards with paternal love. Asklepius is begotten of 
Sun in tlie Kosmos, to preserve the life and harmony of oniuiB, 
which he is the author and sustainer. Though enjoying with 
Sun a premundane existence, he was made incarnate on cyr. 200 a 
earth by the vivifying power of Sun, and endowed with human 
form to heal both bodies and souls of men, with which bene- 
ficent purpose he wandered — whether allegorically or no it is 
hard to decide— through all the great towns of earth. The or. l 152 d 
Muses and the Graces are the offspring of Sun and serve him 
as their lord. The lower demigods, such as Korybants, oj^ s- les b. 
Satyrs, Fauns, Bacchants take rank as daemons. 

These shadowy identities are gleaned submissively from Homeric 
the preserves of' lamblichus. Both in spirit and form Plo- ^ j,^.'"-^^"^ 
tinus' identifications had been more philosophic and rational, trusted. 
though open to a charge of tameness from the monotonous 
recurrence of personifications of the World-soul as manifested 
in higher or lower spheres \ The obvious vagueness of this 
survey, which minimises not exaggerates Julian's own lack 
of precision, shows how shadowy and unreal his assumed 
personifications are. They are of a random, caleidoscopic 
character. The picturesque stir and life of the old Hel- 
lenic Olympus is all gone. It has nothing in common with 
the new-faDgled mysticism but some borrowed names and 
metaphors^. The Gods are no longer living, breathing men 
and women, active in love and in hate, girded with poetry, 
ravishing to the sense. All individuality is lost. There is 
no form and no colour left. The vivid lines and outlines are 
smeared into a neutral expressionless smudge. Personal Gods 
have been metamorphosed into scientific and theological con- 
ceptions or mathematical ideas; mythology has become 'a. 
philosopho-cosmical and physico-astronomical system ^' One 

1 Zeus, Aphrodite (in twofold manifestation), Here, Demeter, Hestia all 
represent one or other phase of this. Cf. Zeller, in. 2, p. 561. 

2 Schlosser, Jen. allg. Literat.-Ztg. p. 127. 

3 Strauss, DerRomant. p. 190 ; and from the same work compare p. 192. 
"In diesem Neuplatonischen Himmel dagegen ist nichts mehr fest, Alles 
taumelt durcheinander, in einer Gotterdammerung gleichsam zerfliessen alle 
scharfen Umrisse der Gestalten : Zeus ist Helios, ist auch Hades und 
Serapis ; Prometheus ist die iiher alles sterhliche waltende Vorsehung ; 



96 JULIAN. 

effect of this is to invest the entire religion with a frigid and 
laboured artificiality that must have chilled piety and lamed 
all devout enthusiasm, even if it did not suggest a self-con- 
scious insincerity. It showed the very opposite of the free 
Hellenic spirit; it was forced instead of natural, exaggerated 
instead of true, constrained instead of free. Amid this misty 
confounding of deities one positive idea of some interest is 
discernible. For the old republican con.stitution of the 
Homeric Olympus with its independent and often mutually 
antagonistic powers, with its jealousies and favouritisms and 
animosities, there has been substituted a strict and ordered 
hierarchy of graded deities, centering their aspirations and 
even merging their personality in the supreme divinity, 
whose sway represented in ideal j)erfection that absolute 
dominion to which the Emperor of Rome only in theory 
attained \ 
delation to To discover hard and fast identities, or even principles of 
"^theology, arrangement in this cloudland, is impossible. But it is easy 
to define the general position taken up towards the popular 
theology. This was contained primarily in Homer, Hesiod, 
and various collections of Hymns of the Gods, These the 
Frng. Ep. now religion accepted as of divine authority, and written by 

3Ui B, 302 A. _ ... . . . . 

direct inspiration. Homer is habitually quoted in Julian's 
works with the weight of an inspired authority. How keenly 
the defectiveness of these as Sacred Books was felt by the 
Neo-Platonists is shown by Porphyrins' endeavour to supply 
the lacuna by a collection of the utterances of the Oracles. 
Such as they were, however, Julian and his confederates ac- 
cepted them, and adapted them to their purpose by an elastic 
system of allegorical interpretation. It was in the myths 
more than anywhere else that the popular religious concep- 

aber dasselbe ist aucli Athene ; welclie in cTiesem Systeme Tocliter des 
Helios lieisst ; " and p. 193, "Die Gotter bilden (das hatte man der cliristli- 
chen Trinitats-Terminologie abgeliort) eine Yielheit olane Theiluug und eiue 
Einheit obne Vermischung; zu der absoluten Wirksamkeit des obersten 
Gottes verhalten sich alle iibrigen nur uoch als unselbststandige Durcli- 
gangspunkte." Compare Or. 4. 149 d, 153 d, 156 c — 157 A. Also Semiscli, 
p. 33. 

1 Strauss, Der Rom. p. 191, Semiscb, p. 32. 



THEOLOGY. 97 

tions were really enshrined. Julian's treatment of these is Mijths, 
bold and instructive : so bold that at times he seems almost ^^e^f^ora 
to stand on his defence asrainst a charsre of irreverence. He ?"«*• ^o^ o 
freely admits that many of the ancient myths were as they ) 
stood grossly immoral and impious. But this very fact goes ^y^- ^4 a b 
to prove that they cannot be actually and nakedly true. I 
Venerable with the dust of antiquity, but stamped with the , 
brand of inspiration, they are handed down to us as apoca- 
lyptic glimpses into those truths which the flagging intellect : 
of man can neither accurately grasp nor formulate. They ' 
are sign-posts, not termini ; their function is to excite the in- or. s. 170 a b 
tellectual powers, not satisfy. Myths then, such is his theory, 
stand to the intellectual sense much in the same relation as 
images to the spiritual. They are but emblematic represen- or. 7. 206 c 
tations of the truth, not literal statements of fact. Wrongly 
regarded they infallibly obscure and misrepresent the inner 
truth they allegorise. They are so to say concrete mental 
projections into time and place of that which happened out 
of all temporary or local relations. The very contradictions 
or incongruities with which they abound are meant expressly Or. 5. 170 a-c 
to stimulate men to look behind the veil and decipher the 
hidden mystery. From the necessity of the case they are in 
every particular anthropomorphic in conception, whereas the or. 7. 220 
truths and processes they adumbrate are wholly spiritual, ^t Kiizji^ 
The mythical birth of Helios from Hyperion and Theia is not or. 4. ise c d 
meant as an account of marriage and processes of generation 
among the Gods, ideas which are wholly incongruous with 
their very nature : its real signification is that Helios, first 
among the Intelligible Gods, sprang by emanation from a 
Cause yet higher still, that Cause to wit which is of all most 
divine (deiorarov), and which wholly transcends (TTrepicov 
going beyond, above) all comprehension, for Whom and round 
Whom are all things create or uncreate. So again the pro- 
cession of Athene from the head of Zeus, which materially on 4. 149 b 
conceived becomes meaningless blasphemy, sets forth in a^'''^'^^°'^ 
figure the spiritual truth that she came forth entire by imme- 

^ Julian of course is simply adopting the regular Neo-Platonic teaching 
on Myths ; cf. e.g. Sallust, De diis et mundo, c, xiv. xviii. 

E. E. 7 



98 JULIAN. 

diate emanation from the highest God. The interpretation 
of the myth of Cybele and Attis, which runs through so 
much of Julian's Fifth Oration, is a more elaborate and am- 
bitious effort in the same direction. Under Julian's handling 
it becomes in part a ' solar mytli,' but primarily a more tran- 
scendental revelation. 
and ra- Myths thus regarded are a testimony to something of a 

tiomle. progressive revelation of God to man. As birds fly and fish 
Or. 7. 20CA swim by instinct, with none to teach or guide the way, so 
man too has his nobler instinct, that will not be denied its 
satisfaction. The Gods have given him a soul, and that soul, 
even in man's infancy, could not but flutter and try its wings. 
Imbued with godlike affinities it tugged at the chain that 
held it, soaring toward truth. Shadowy images, visions of 
unknown glories floated before it. As the feathers^ sprouted 
upon the infant soul, a strange tingling, half of pleasure half 
of pain, thrilled it through and through. The soul itching 
with intolerable desire found relief in myths. They were 
like nurses rubbing the infant's gums at teeth-cutting, re- 
lieving the irritation and quickening the growth. The itch- 
ing was but the herald of growing powers, myths but the 
/ foreshadowing of coming revelations. The full-grown philo- 
^ sopher, while recognising that they may serve the infant still, 
knows that they were presages of more solid supervening 

Or. 7. 207 a- abilities. Thev are of use still maybe to spice moral teach- 
208 A "^ . .:..-. 

ing distasteful in its severe simplicity, and so to sweeten 

nauseous truths. But the perfect man has no need of sweets. 

He seeks rather the strong meat and medicine, which the 

sweet but obscured or rendered ineffective. 

Popular Such was Julian's abstract dogmatic theology. It is no 

^of^NeT^"'^ disparagement of his creed to say that it was impossible to 

PiatoTiic present its loftier truths to the capacities of popular intelli- 

'^"'^' gence. If theology is a science at all, it follows at once that 

its deeper mysteries will be accessible to those only who are 

versed in the science. The popular creed will remain a rough 

and imperfect representation of the truths it but dimly per- 

1 Julian here (Or. 7. 206) is almost quoting the Phaedrun. 



THEOLOGY. 99 

ceives. By what modifications then or adaptations were 
these religious conceptions commended to the public ? 

In the first place, the purely intellectual side was per- inteiiec- 
force left in the background. The doctrine of a trinity, the ^ufication. 
relation of emanating Deities to the incomprehensible First 
Cause, the interdependence of Intelligible and Intellectual 
Gods on each other and on the primal One were left to the 
philosophers. But a far more vital modification than this 
was adopted. Monotheism, which was in a sense the creed Mom- 
of the Neo-Platonist, and the language of which Julian con- ^j^^/eci. 
Stan tly employs in intercourse with his philosophic friends, e. g. £p. 44. 
was in its popular representation wholly abandoned. It is 
metamorphosed into polytheism, pure and simple. Nor does 
Julian attempt to conceal it. In temple-worship, lustrations, 
sacrifices, indeed in everything, he says, the Jews are in 
exact accord with the Pagans, excejot in the peculiarity of a cjyr. 
ononotheistic belief. 'Their sole error is in doing a displeasure | 
to the other Gods by reserving their worship for the God Jkp. 63. iu a 
whom they with barbarian pride and stupidity regard as , 
their special property, relegating the rest to the Gentiles 
alone.' Monotheism is positively denounced as 'a calura- c'yr. 166 c 
niation of the Deity.' The transformation was as simple as 
it was necessary to win the popular ear. It merely involved 
a certain ignoring or rather reticence concerning higher 
esoteric mysteries, which is not even chargeable with insin- 
cerity. Philosophers themselves believed in the Gods as 
emanating agents of the One God: nay more believed that 
through them alone contact with the One was possible for 
anything short of the highest philosophic intuition. 

The whole genius of Neo-Platonism was essentially poly- Poiythe- 
theistic. The Monotheistic element was subsidiary, a satis- f *"'' ''**^' 
faction and a secret for the philosopher, but for the multitude \ 
at most a tenet never a belief, a theory not a motive power. 
The One was incomprehensible, incommunicable, unapproach- ^ 
able by man ; the Gods who governed the universe about 
him, who ruled him and his destiny, who heard his petitions, 
who shielded him from evil, were subordinate, many in num- 
ber, diverse in form and desires and powers. This concep- 

7—2 
L.ofC, 



100 



JULIAN. 



Or. 4. 140 A 
cf. Cyr. (55. 



A dap- 
tivity of 
beliefs. 



Cvr. 116 A, 
131 BC, 138. 



Frao. Ep. 
302 b 

Ep. 63. 453 



11 



tion had firmly embedded itself in the religion of mankind. 
'Throughout the whole world you find one single concurrent 
law and testimony, that there is one God, king and father of 
all, and Gods many, sons of God and joint rulers with God. 
This Greek declares and this Barbarian, this the dweller on 
the mainland and the dweller by the sea, this the wise man 
and the fool\' In Julian's own language, 'The Demiurge of 
the universe is one ; the demiurgic deities, the denizens of 
heaven, are many.' It was a belief requiring the concen- 
trated forces of Christianity to extirpate it : within the 
Church, in its last subtle phase of Arianism, it only not 
prevailed ; without, it was seized by Neo-Platonism, coordi- 
nated with the highest reason and conscience of mankind, 
systematised, sanctioned, and wielded in all its versatile 
applications. 

From this standpoint Julian was able to exhibit a ready 
and generous sympathy with whatever form of cult had 
commended itself to the people with whom he might be 
concerned ^ He assiduously emphasizes the value he at- 
taches to the preservation of local rites or beliefs. Each is 
in itself a revelation : to surrender an ancestral rite is to 
fling away a fragment of revealed truth. Hence a scrupulous 
reverence for all traditional sanctities. Nations by a curious 
inversion of facts are regarded as representing, or as moulded 
by, the character of their tutelar Gods. To Heliopolis must 
be given back its Aphrodite- worship, to the Jews their 
temple, to the shrine of Serapis the cubit of the Nile. 'lu 
things holy we do well to preserve whatsoever ancestral 
custom prescribes : we must neither add thereto nor di- 
minish a whit therefrom ; for that which is of the Gods is 
everlasting.' High priests were directed to follow the same 
rule in their visitations, never to extemporise new rites or 
improve upon old, but to shun innovation above all things'. 
In precisely the same spirit Julian systematically endeavours 

' Maxim. Tyrius, Diss. i. 

^ His teaching here is in complete accord with Porphyry's. For passages 
see Zeller, iii. 2, pp. 610, 611, 

3 At the deification of Emperors, partly as unspiritual, but much more 
as an innovation, .Julian launches a bitter sarcasm, Caes. 332 d. 



THEOLOGY. 101 

appropriately to localise his references to the Gods, If he 
writes to the Komans, he dwells on the special connexion of 
Helios with Rome, reminding them how the great God by 
his connexion with Venus and Mars becomes through Aeneas or. 4. 154 a— 

^ loo A 

and Romulus respectively the immediate patron of Rome : 
how further the tale of the miraculous assumption of Quirinus, 
and not less Numa's ordinance concerning the sacred fire 
recognises him still as tutelar divinity of their favoured 
town ; and how they are even reminded of the fact by the 
measurement of months and the season of the opening of the 
new year. If it is to the Athenians he addresses himself, it odAth.'LKx, 
is to Athene, the most wise Goddess, that he appeals. If he 
takes up his pen to the Alexandrians, he exhorts them to a EpVi. 378 c, 
better mind by the reverence that they owe their patron- ^p- ^i- 
saint and founder Alexander, or adjures them by the name 
of Serapis their city-holding King and his maiden-consort 
Isis. To the Jews, to take a yet more interesting sample of 
the same spirit, he adopts their own monotheistic language. Ep. 25. 
Their God, he says, is the same all-powerful and beneficent 
ruler of the universe whom we Greeks worship, though under Ep. 63. 45i a 
varying names. After commending their faith and sympa- 
thising with the maltreatment they had endured, he entreats 
them to offer up prayers for him and for the Empire, 'to the ^p. 25. 397c 
most high God and Creator, who has deigned to crown me 
with his undefiled right hand'; in his treatise against the 
Christians he says in so many words, 'I adore always the cyr. 354b 
God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.' It is droll to watch 
with what scrupulous consistency Julian carries out the 
same principle even in playful and familiar correspondence. ] 
If he writes to a philosopher, Hermes of reason, or the I 
Muses will be the Deity selected ; unless indeed he be in |,s- ^- s, 
poor health, when wishes for his convalescence will be for- 
tified by the name of Asklepius : while in a letter to an ^Pj^^q. ^^^ 
Egyptian official the name of Serapis naturally becomes the 
appropriate vehicle for indignation. The changes in adju- Ep. 6. 376 a 
ration that are rung remind the reader of Acres' device for 
adding point and relevance to the formulae of oath\ 
1 Cf. Sheridan, The Rivals. 



102 JULIAN. 

Exoteric In his exoteric teaching Julian is perfectly content to 

eat tt7ig. ^^^ forward the lower and more popular motive or expla- 
nation, where he does not think an appeal to the higher 
will wake a responsive echo. The appeal he thought must 

Cues. 314 c be accommodated to the audience. In the Csesars he gently 
censures the stern uncompromising Probus for not thus 
adapting himself to the people. Wise doctors mix bitter 
draughts with honey to suit the unaccustomed palate : like 
cows or horses, men are easiest led by what they like. A 
good instance of this occurs in one of his letters to the 

Ei>. 61 Alexandrians : there in exhorting them to the worship of 
Helios, he says no word of the theological position or rela- 
tions of that divinity, but appeals simply to the natural 
power of the visible sun, and bids them as they look on the 
changing seasons, on the processes of birth and growth, and 
on the ordered phases of the Moon, fall down and worship 
the manifested and all-powerful Deity, 

His popular as contra-distinguished from his philoso- 
phical teaching on the nature and attributes of these Gods, 
and the manner in which he desired they should be regarded, 
leads naturally to a consideration of Julian's idea of personal 
religion. 



CHAPTER V. 



JULIAN S IDEA OF RELIGION. 



t6 Ke<f>aXaLov evdaijxovla^ i] tQv Oeuv yvSicns. 
/j.iyiaTOi> T(2v koCKuv t) 6eoa4§ei,a. 

Julian. 



In his religious teaching Julian does not commence with 
evidences of the existence of God. God with him was a 
primary assumption; the knowledge of God is intuitive in 
man. 'By our souls,' he writes, 'we are all intuitively per- on 7. 209 c 
suaded of the existence of a Deity\' Thus assuming the 
religious sense, he deduces from it the true relations of man 
to God, and to his fellow creatures. 

Julian's idea of personal religion is undeniably lofty: its imvard re- 
elevation of tone again and again betrays the Christian ^^^°"' 
sources from which it was in large measure — and not seldom 
confessedly — drawn. If Christian shortcomings inevitably ^ 
paved the way for a Pagan reaction, at least Christian virtues 
determined the cast which that reaction must take. Soaring Duty to 
beyond a utilitarian morality it recognised a duty to God as ^°^* 
well as a duty to man. Eeligion is the highest concern of fml^'^j.^° 
man, the most essential factor of happiness. Knowledge of the or. 5. iso b 

. Or. 7. 222 c 

Gods is more desirable than the Empire of Eome : likeness to Or. e. is.s a 

•■• ' Or. 7. 225 D 

the Gods the crown of philosophy; devoutness and diligence ^y-i'^i" 
in the service of the Gods are the primary requisites for due or. 2. 86 a 
discharge of duty. Our souls — it is a noble Neo-Platonic 
thought — are not our own, but rather lent by God for a p>-^ff- ^p- 

° "^ 302 

^ So too very explicitly the author of De Myst. i. 3. 'Knowledge of the 
Gods is an inherent impression inseparably implanted in us, co-operating 
with the essential inclination of the soul towards the good, superseding 
every judgment or deliberation, and antecedent to thought or argumentation 
upon the subject.' 



104 JULIAN. 

season. They are given to each man as genii or spiritual 

Or. 2. 09 A powers, located as it were on the highest surface of the body, 

so as to raise men from earth to the proper kinship that 

Or. 6. 190 D, belon<Ts to them in heaven. The soul is 'the God within us': 

or.'-i 90 b it is of heavenly birth, a colonist for a little space upon earth, 

imprisoned in the human body as a sanctifying and elevating 

>• power. And with this godlike element, waging unintermit- 

ting warfare with the dark and murky powers of the flesh ^, 

we must make it our endeavour to attain to absolute devotion 

Or. 5. ITS B c of heart to God. 'When the soul surrenders itself entire unto 

the Gods, committing itself and all it hath to them that are 

greater than itself; then if purification follows under the 

guidance of the ordinances of the Gods, so that there is 

thenceforth nought to let or hinder — for all things are in the 

Gods, around them do all things consist, and of the Gods all 

things are full — forthwith there shineth in such souls the 

divine light; instinct with God they brace and enable the 

kindred spirit, which thereby steeled as it were by them and 

waxing strong is made salvation unto the whole body.' This 

knowledge or spiritual recognition of God is not merely 

Or. 2. 08 B worthy of a monarch or general, but lifts man almost to the 

A<i. Them, levol of diviuitv itself. Imitation of the Gods, as evinced by 

25«B . •' ' "^ 

Vacs. 334 A the suppression of human wants and weaknesses, and by 
constant enlargement of virtuous activity must be the aim of 
the believer. True holiness (eiVe/Seia) is to live ever in the 

Frap. Ep. practico of the presence of God. Unseen though they be, the 
Gods are ever near, watching our every action : so that in the 
words of the inspired oracle 

Everywhere the ray of Phoebus darts its all-pervading light; 
Through the flint rocks unimpeded it pursues its nimble flight ; 
Through the azure depths it courses ; not the circling starry throng 
Eanging heaven under sway of laws inexorably strong 
Can escape it ; nor the toiling denizens of nether gloom 
Whom dim Tartarus immureth, each according to his doom — 
But in godly souls unto virtue given 
299 D I have joy that passeth the joys of heaven. 

- For conflict in man between body and soul, of. Or. 4. 142 d, Sittt] yap 
earl fiaxo/J-^vy] <ptj(ns eh iu KeKpajxivrj ^vxv^ xal crd)fxaTos, tijs fiev deias, tov 
Se ffKOTeivov re Kal ^ocpiLBovs' loiK^ re elvai p-a-xv ns Kal ffracjis, Cf. Frag. Ep. 
299 A, Or. 2. 70 a b, Or. 6. 184 a. 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 105 

Thus God liimself of his great kindness declares that he takes Fra^- ep. 
delight in the thoughts of the holy, which are dear to him as 
heaven's self. This holiness or godly reverence must declare 
itself in all our actions. Zeal in the small duties of life, in 293 d 
whatsoever is given us to do, is the surest test of true holiness. 
Among other parts of men's duty to God are enjoined piety, 293 a, 300 c. 
chastity, solemn meditation on divine things, and honour 
paid to God by holy worship. Prayer too is the duty of every 
believer, and no less his privilege, for so ready is the divine / 
ear that 'the Gods prevent our prayers \' No precise rule for \ 
laymen is laid down, beyond that prayer should be conducted mis. za d 
reverently and in silence; by his own example^ Julian would 
bid them pray at least in all great emergencies and crises of 
life ; but priests are expressly bidden to pray often, both in I 
private and in public, certainly thrice a day, or at least twice, 
at daybreak and at nightfall, for it is not seemly that any ^^^3- Ep. 
priest should spend day or night without a sacrifice. 

In his conception of duty to man, Julian takes no less Duty to 
high a tone. 'Ye are all,' he says, 'brothers one of another. „„, * 

C _ ' .; ' ^ 291 D, 292 B. 

God is the common father of us all' From this fundamental 
truth of the universal brotherhood of man follows by logical 
deduction the obligation of charity to all. 'I maintain,' writes ■ 
Julian, 'though I speak a paradox, that it is a sacred duty to 290 d 
impart raiment and food even to our enemies ; for the bond 
of humanity, not the disposition of individuals, regulates our 
giving.' The duty of kindness, of almsgiving in the widest 
sense, he emphasizes again and again. It is the homily put 
in the mouth of every priest to every Gentile; the good ^91,^431 b 
customs of first-fruits and contributions to the service of the 
sanctuaries had fallen into a shameful desuetude: Believers 
had forgotten the undying precept of Homer, that 

^ (pddvovui. ol 0eol ras eiJ%as, Or. 2. 92 B. As regards the rationale of 
prayer, its efficacy according to the Neo-Platonist scheme was bound up with 
the sympathetic though unconscious coherence of all nature by virtue of 
the one pervading soul. Doctrinally it stands on the same footing as magic 
in its widest sense. See Zeller, Phil, der Gr. iii. 2, p. 564, and De Myst. 1. 
15, V. 26. 

2 So. before his exaltation; for of coiu'se as Emperor, Julian was priest as 
well. 



106 JULIAN. 

Zeus unfolds our hospitable door, 
'Tis Zeus that sends the stranger and the poor^ 

Fra<). Kp. Each bcc'Gfar that ffoes about the street is, says Julian, an 

289 1)— 2'JO A . ®° ° . . 

insult upon the Gods. It is our greed, not the unkindness of 
tlie Gods, that leaves him in such a plight; and in passing 
him by unaided we make ourselves the authors of untrue 
conceptions and unjust reproaches against the Deity. 'No 
290 c man,' he continues, 'ever became poor from giving alms to 
his neighbours. Often have I given to the needy and re- 
ceived back mine own from them a hundredfold, and never 
do I repent of having given aught.' We must give according 
to the measure of our means, for the virtue lies in the dispo- 
sition of the giver rather than in the amount of the gift. As 
Julian borrowing almost the language of the New Testament 
again and again bids the believer 'above all things practise 
charity"^, for in its train come many other goods,' there rings 
in the reader's ears the familiar 'the greatest of these is 
charity.' 
Moral Personal chastity^ is another moral obligation on which he 

Fraf^Ep. strougly insists. All criminal or even unseemly self-indul- 
157/343 B c gence is prohibited to the moral man, who will abstain from 
the exciting and often licentious spectacles to be witnessed at 
the theatres or other places of public resort. To be in bond- 
or. 6. 198 c age to the grosser appetites or passions is to create for our- 
selves a very hell upon earth. Sins of temper, hatred, 
ji//«. 343b passion, abusiveness, are to be guarded against; patience, 
forbearance and gentleness to be practised. Another re- 
markable characteristic of Julian's religious code is the very 
close connexion into which he brings observance of law with 
Or. 2. 89 A religion. 'The law is the daughter of justice, a hallowed and 
divinely consecrated treasure of the most high God, which no 

1 Horn. Od. 14. 56, Pope's version. The same quotation recurs in a 
similar context in Frag. Ep. 291 b. 

2 (pLKavdp(jOTTla, love of the neighbour, in its fullest sense. Frag. Ep. 289 a. 

3 This obhgation formed part of the Neo-Platonic view of &<xK-q<ns : see 
infr. p. 118, 133. Porphyrins denounced all sexual indulgence, first as directly 
prejudicial to the soul and subjecting it to the dominion of sense, secondly 
indirectly, as producing new forms of life in which spirit was tied to matter. 
Zeller, in. 2, p. 598. 



* 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 107 

sensible man will undervalue or dishonour.' It is distinctly 
a part of a man's duty to his neighbour to be submissive, J^'*- 343 a, 
respectful to the authorities, observant of law. 'The true 
prince must be a prophet and minister of the king of the Or. 2. 90a 
Gods,' for 'the laws are holy unto the Gods:' 'the oruardians Frap.Ep. 

'' _ ® 289 A 

of the laws are in a manner priests unto the Gods.' Service ^^*^ '^ 
of the Gods and the laws are coupled together as equally mis. s43 a 
essential to true morality {a-as^poavvrj) . 

Such then were Julian's ideas regarding religion as an Outward 
inward moral power, and such the rules of conduct he laid 
down. By way of sanction and confirmation these were to 
be supplemented by ceremonial observances. The Pagan 
convert was to be admitted — or readmitted — into his new 
religion by rites of purification analogous to baptism, and 
by prayer to the averting^ Deities. Julian himself was duly 
initiated into the Eleusinian rites at Athens, and then or on 
some other occasion washed off the taint of Christian baptism 
with the blood of slain sacrifices ; as the Christian father puts 
it, 'he purged off the laver with unholy blood, matching our 
initiation with the initiation of defilement^' He declined to 
admit to Pagan worship any Christian, who had not first been 
purged in soul by solemn litanies, and in body by set lustral 
rites. From thenceforth he was to become a regular attend- 
ant at divine service, to revere the temples, groves and 
images of the Gods, to the maintenance of which, as a pious 
believer, he would naturally contribute. Indeed he was in 
all respects to invest with its proper dignity and use that 
elaborate ceremonialism and public ritual which Julian 
laboured so energetically to restore. 

For Julian, here palpably and confessedly plagiarising ThePriest- 
from Christianity, endeavoured to fortify his religious revival |p^f2. 450 c 
by a restored and purified ceremonialism. He came forward 
with a carefully prepared system of sacerdotalism. The 
priesthood was no longer to be a kind of hereditary property, 
transmitted as a social prerogative from father to son, irre- 

•^ Ep. 52. 436 c, avoTphiraioL deal. 

2 Greg. Naz. Or. 4. 576 b, with which cf. Soz. 5. 2, and Jiil. Or. 7. 231 d. 
V. supr. p. 51. 



108 



JULIAN, 



spective of the qualifications of the possessor. It was no 

more to be confined to favoured families. Distinctions of 

fosT ^^' poverty or wealth, high birth or low, were obliterated. The 

qualifications required were henceforth to be moral not social: 

the sole tests of fitness love of God and love of man : love of 

^^^ " God first, as displa3^ed in the religion and godly bringing up 

of a man's own household ; love of man second, as tested by 

a ready and liberal charity in proportion to the means at 

Training command. The most religious and best of the citizens being 

of priests, ® , , ^° 

thus selected, were to be carefully trained in a manner suit- 

° able to their high calling. A guard was to be set on their 
^"^^"^•^^^ thoughts, no less than upon their tongues. For their intel- 
lectual training, they were to avoid scrupulously not only 
indecent and lascivious writings, the sarcasms of Archilochus 
and the snarls of Hipponax, not only profane and sceptical 
philosophies, but also all that was trivial and frivolous, such 
as the Old Comedy, or love-tales, or works of fiction. They 
should study history, and for their philosophical training be 
reared on the pure milk of Pythagoras and Plato, and on the 
sound meat of Aristotle, to which should be added judicious 
selections from the religious teaching of Chr^'sippus and 
Zeno. But no word of Epicurus or of Pyrrho must enter 
their ears. For devotional training, besides private exercises 
of prayer and attendance at public worship, they were to 
^"^■^ " commit to heart and meditate upon the Sacred Hymns, the 
direct revelations of the Gods. When thus duly trained 
they were doubtless consecrated for their high functions by 
a solemn ordination service. No positive directions have 
chanced to survive, for Julian composed no formal Priest's 
Manual, but left only a variety of pastoral letters, called out 
by special occasions, and treating therefore of special points, 
from which his complete system may be fairly gleaned. But 
taking into account the common practice of Pagans and 
Christians alike, together with the analogy of the lustral rites 
of admission to the Church, it may fairly be assumed that 
provisions for priestly consecration were not omitted in the 

Duties of ^^^^ °^ ritual elaborated by Julian. 

priests. The duties of the priest are carefully prescribed. To take 



IDEA OF EELIGION. 109 

first his distinctly religious duties. Twice or thrice a day 

must lie sacrifice, not without prayer : when his turn for duty Praq. Ep. 

, 1 1 • 1 1 • f 1 1 • • 1 ^02 A— 303 A, 

m the pubhc celebration oi tempie-worship arrives, he must 
purify himself night and day : he must continually be at his 
post within the temple for his term of office, which according 
to the Eoman custom at least extends over thirty^ days : 
during that space he should neither visit the market nor go 
to his own dwelling, but occupy himself wholly with divine 
worship and philosophic meditations. For his private bear- Priests' 
ing similarly strict injunctions are laid down. Among the ^"'''^y ^^■^'^' 
first duties of a priest is that charity, on which Julian so 
strenuously insists : it is an attribute of the Deity^, and 
therefore precious in his eyes : it will exercise itself in liberal 
almsgiving and ready hospitality. For active practical virtue sosb 
is the highest religion, and holiness the child of righteous 
dealing. Habitual chastity, not only of person but in thought 
and word', holiness, which is to say the constant realised l^'g"*^- _^^-g g_ 
sense of God's presence, modesty, forbearance and gentleness 
of demeanour, and what is more vaguely termed goodness, Ep 63. 453 a 
are among the duties specially inculcated. Further, there 
must be always that gravity of demeanour, that sanctity, the 
habitual assumption of which by the Christian priests has Ep. 49. 429 » 
tended so effectively to promote their religion. In order to 
this the priest will abstain rigidly from attendance at the Frap. Ep. 
theatres : he will eschew all public games, horse-races, and Ep. 49. 430 b 
the like : he will never frequent the wine-taverns, nor en- 
gage in any kind of business that could bring contempt upon 
his profession. Nay more, not content with these negative 
protests against dissolute or careless living, he will be very 
choice as to the society he keeps. Actors, jockeys and Frap. Ep. 

1 La Bleterie in his note observes that the minimum of residence en- 
joined by local statutes to the prebendaries in most cathedrals is exactly the 
same amount. The terms or rather duties of residence are certainly far less 
arduous. 

^ <})i\avdpo3wia is Julian's word thrice repeated in Frag. Ep. 289 a b, of. 
also Frag. Ep, 300 b, Ep. 49. 429 d. With it is conjoined x/'Wot"'?^ in Ep. 
63. 453 A. There can be httle doubt that Tit. iii. 4 was present to Julian's 
mind, 17 xP^Tdr-qs koL ij (piKavOpuiria tov cruTTJpos riiiwv OeoD. 

» Frag. Ep. 300 c d, 302 d, of. Niceph. x. 4. 



110 JULIAN. 

dancers he will absolutely avoid; and while permitted to resort 
Frap. Ep. freely to the houses and entertainments of his friends, to en- 
hanee his priestly dignity he will but rarely frequent the 
Ep. 49. 431 c market ; and will moreover seldom visit or meet municipal 
dignitaries or officers, except in temples and places where his 
sacerdotal position gives him acknowledged precedence : as a 
general rule he will communicate with them by letter alone. 
^'^!;^|^9j,?J *" Above all he will bring up his own family in sobriety and 
304 D, 305 B. ^1^^ |-gj^j, ^£ God: the women, children, and domestics of his 
household will attend regularly the public services : a priest 
failing in this deserves to be dismissed from his priestly 
office. 
Priestly Among the priests there is to be a regular discipline and 

orders. various orders. Below the priest came the inferior orders of 
Ep. 49. 430 c clergy, acolytes, and the like, who will be drawn from the 
poorer classes, and as paid subordinates of the priests will 
'serve' at the celebrations of temple-worship. While above 
the priests, administering set districts or dioceses as over- 
seers, will be the ' high priests ' or ' bishops.' These Julian 
frequently chose from among the philosophers, who were his 
personal friends and guides. Chrysanthius, for instance, was 
named high priest of Lydia. It was their duty to conduct 
regular visitations of their dioceses, to promote meritorious 
Ep. 02. 451 c priests ; and, on the other hand, to exhort, rebuke, chastise, 
or even dismiss the unworth}^ : at the same time he was 
bound rigorously to abstain from personal violence ; * a bishop 
Ep. 63. 453 A must be no striker.' Moderation and appreciative kindness 
are the primary requisites. In one of his 'pastoral' letters 
Ep. 63 Julian promotes the high priest Theodorus to such a position 
Ep. 49 in Asia : another he addresses to Arsakius, who holds a simi- 
-f.> 62 lar place in the district of Galatia ; while in a third, he 
himself, in virtue of his high priestly authority, suspends an 
unworthy priest for a term of three calendar months. In 
this instance, as habitually in sacrifice and temple-worship, 
Fraci. Ep. Julian asserts very plainly his own sacerdotal prerogative : 
J?;;. 62. 451b ^^ {g ^s sovcreign pontiff of the national Church, and as 
mouthpiece of the Didymsean oracle that he pronounces 
sentence. 



IDEA OF RELIGION. Ill 

His treatment of this question of unworthy priests is full Discipline 
of interest, and shows how strongly he was impressed with "•' ^^^ ^ 
the need and value of that ecclesiastical discipline which was 
theoretically maintained in the Christian Church, though 
among his own contemporaries it so often fell into abeyance 
before the consuming blight of heresy and its attendant 
spirit of faction. In his surviving Pontifical ' Charge ' he ^'J'-^- ^^■ 
dwells upon it at length. The unworthiness of a priest or a 
prophet cannot indeed cast any reflection upon the perfect- 
ness of the God he unworthily serves, nor can any personal 
demerit degrade the majesty of his office. So long as he 297 a— c 
bears the name of priest and ministers before the altar, he 
must be regarded with a submissive and reverential piety as 
the authorised representative of God, to strike or insult Ep. m. 451 b 

^ , Ep. 62. 460 B 

whom is sacrilege. He is no less consecrate to God than 
the inanimate stones of which the image or altar is fashioned, 
and like them is to be reverenced for his consecration's sake. 
But if he is a notorious or open sinner, then the high priest ^^■^lf'1^^1 
should first openly admonish and rebuke him, and if he still 
persist, should chastise him heavily, and at the last strip him Fran. Ep. 
of his priesthood as a reprobate. For the solemn anathema 
with which the ancients accompanied such degradation Ju- 
lian finds no divine, or as we may say Scriptural, authority. i?p.62. 451cd 
Thus it is in our power to gather very fully Julian's con- Dignity of 
ception of the priestly office. It is a calling more exalted j^'.f,,,. ^p^ '' 
than that of any citizen, for the lustre of the divine dignity is 298 b.' " '^' 

r, 1 -AT- 1- 1 • • £7^. 62. 450 c 

reflected upon it. As the immediate servants and ministers 
of the Gods, priests are in the truest sense their vicars or 
representatives. They pray, they sacrifice, on behalf of the f''«fi'- Ep. 
congregation and in its stead. And no personal unworthi- 295 d 
ness can derogate from their high office. It follows imme^ 
diately that corresponding honour must be paid them. In 
the temple they are supreme, and take rank before all 296 cd 
earthly potentates: the highest officer of state is but a pri- Ep.i&.mco 
vate individual, and lower than the priest so soon as he 
passes the threshold of the shrine. This ina;lienable dignity 
it is the bounden duty of the priest on all occasions to as- 
sert ; no pious believer will contest it, be he an officer of 



112 JULIAN. 

army, of city, or of State, unless he is puffed up with self- 
conceit and vain-glory. 
Priest' It will be sufficient merely to mention the fact that 

esses. priestesses as well as priests found a place, as always, in the 
ranks of the Pagan ministry. A brief but interesting letter 
Ep. 21. survives from Julian to the priestess Callixene ; all men, he 
writes, sing the praises of Penelope for the constancy of her 
love to man\ sc. Ulysses. Not less praise could be due to 
Callixene for her love to God; and the constancy of her devo- 
tion had stood the test of not ten but twenty years. As 
a fitting acknowledgment of merit, Julian nominates her 
priestess of Cybele at the famous shrine of Pessinus, in ad- 
dition to the previous dignity she held as priestess of De- 
meter — a proof by the way that pluralists were tolerated in 
the Pagan Church. 
TcmpU With a sound polytheistic basis thus firmly laid, a moral 

u7ii""^' ^^^ annexed, depending for vitality on its purity and eleva- 
tion, and an elaborate sacerdotal structure superadded, Julian 
attempted to reanimate the decaying reverence for the tem- 
ples, to revive the beauties of neglected precincts and the 
splendour of the ancient festivals, to attract and awe the 
public imagination by a more gorgeous ritual, to which the 
genius of Hellenism so freely lent itself The prophecy of 
the blind hag who met him on his entry to Vienne^, and 
hearing that it was Julian Csesar passing by, cried out that 
he should be the restorer of the temples of the Gods, found a 
very literal fulfilment. He did the work in part directly, in 
part indirectly. In some cases he gave state subsidies, or set 
apart local imposts, or contributed from the fiscal purse to 
promote these objects, while at other places he encouraged 
the people to restore the fallen fabric, or duly celebrate the 
time-honoured festivals, by promises of his favour and patron- 
Ep. 49. 431 D age, which not seldom took, as at Pessinus, the very substan- 
tial form of remission of taxation, if they satisfied his wishes 
Eebiiiid- in this respect. Among the most famous of these attempts 
ivgofthe ^^^ Church restoration was the proposed rebuilding of the 

^ (piKavdpla, not (pikaudpurria. 
2 Amin. M. xv. viii. 22. 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 113 

Jewish Temple \ Partly from a desire to signalise his reign 
by lasting architectural memorials, partly from his habitual 
partiality to the Jews, partly perhaps in the hope of giving 
prophecy the lie, he took in hand the enterprise in compli- 
ance with the petition of the Jews. The strange issue of the 
undertaking, and the controversies that have raged around 
it, have imparted a fictitious importance to this particular 
attempt. In itself it was but one item in a long list, and one 
too to which Julian himself has left but one or two passing 
allusions'^. Everywhere throughout the realm, at Heliopolis, 
at Pessinus, at Alexandria, at Antioch, at Cyzicus, he stimu- 
lated like efforts^. Besides rebuilding the temples, Julian Festivals, 
tried everywhere to restore* to something of their ancient '^' 
splendour the solemn festivals, that had everywhere fallen 
into disrepute. To forward this object he not only expressed 
special delight, when such celebrations formed part of the 
programme of his reception, but used himself to contribute 
largely to the maintenance of their becoming magnificence. 
At Batnse, a small Pagan town east of the Euphrates, not Ep. 27. 

^ . , -^ . ' 400 C sq. 

very far from Carrhae in Mesopotamia, he was overjoyed at 
the excellent preservation in which he found the temples 
and groves, and with unfeigned satisfaction contrasted their 
well-to-do appearance with the simple structure of mud and 
wood that served him there for a palace. As Emperor, care- 
less of the offence he might give to a giddy population like 
that of Antioch, he declined to give any of those frivolous or mu. m a 
immodest exhibitions that most gratified the popular taste, 
and confined his bounty to religious celebrations of various 
kinds, the magnificence of which entailed a lavish outlay. 
The Apostle of Paganism employed the imperial prerogative 
to preach as well as practice. He made bold to go down in 
person to the Council of Antioch, and deliver an indignant -Mi*- 362 b sq. 
remonstrance at the scandalous neglect shown in the conduct 

1 For accounts cf. Amm. M. xxiii. 1, Greg. Naz. Or. 5, p. 668 sq., Chrys. 
in lud., Sok. in. 20, Soz. \. 22, Theod. iii. 20, Philost. vii. 9, Theoph. i. 
p. 80, Kedr. i. p. 537, Glyk. iv. p. 470, Nikepli. x. 23. Warburton's Julian 
is a volume 300 pages long on this topic. 

2 Frag. Ep. 295 c, Ep. 25, and perhaps Ep. 30. ^ Soz. v. 3. 
* Lib. irepl TifJ,. 'Ioi;X. p. 57. 

E. E. 8 



114 JULIAN. 

of the yearly festivals. In their dinners and banquets, he 
bitterly said, there was no stint of lavish expenditure : while 
the poverty and meanness of their temple ceremonial would 
have disgraced the remotest hamlet in Pontus. Nor was it 
only to the conduct of special festivals that he devoted himself. 

Ritual. The ordinary temple-service was to be rendered at once more 
attractive and more imposing by an improved ritual. His 
taste for music, and that general aesthetic susceptibility which 
characterised him as a true Hellene, made him specially alive 
to the advantage of such accessories to worship. In the 
Ep.6Q gi-eat towns choir-boys were to be selected and carefully 
trained in sacred music, their maintenance being provided 
for at the public cost. These Ephebi, or choristers, were to 
Mis. 3C2 A be habited in white, richly set off by ornamental appendages. 

Ep. 27. 400 c Thus the charm of surplices, the steam of incense, the lines 
of initiated hierophants and bearers of the sacred basket' 
would match or outvie the nascent pomp of Christian ritual ; 
nor in allurements for the aesthetic were the tastes of the 
religious overlooked. However undevotional was the spirit 
of fourth century Paganism, Julian hoped it might become 
less so. Pulpits, with all the charm of novelty, swelled the 
furniture of the sanctuary ; lectures were held and addresses 
delivered by trained expositors of Hellenic dogma. The 

^Tf-lfiA officiating priest was to be robed very sumptuously, though 
when not acting officially he was to wear the modest gar- 
ments that befitted his humility, imitating the retiring 
modesty of Amphiaraus, who when he went to the battle 
bore no crest or blazon upon his shield. The holy vestments 
, were not to be made a public spectacle or gazingstock about 
the streets : to do so were dishonour to the symbolised 
majesty of the Gods : they must be seen and worn only in 
the holy place, where none but the pure in heart drew nigh. 

Temple By example and precept alike Julian did his utmost to 

encourage, at times almost to enforce, regular attendance at 
religious services^ Worship he looked upon not as necessary 

1 Nikeph. x. 4. 

^ So, immediately ou liis perversion, Soz. v. 1, cf. Amm. M. xxii. v. 2, 
Sok. III. 11. 



Services 
Mis. 344 c 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 115 

to the Gods, as though in any carnal sense they fed on the caes. 333 d 
smoke and reek of sacrifice: nor again as positively necessary 
to man, for indeed the highest natures might rise above it; 
but rather as the natural outward correlative of inward rever- Or. 2. 70 d 
ence and virtue, a due to the Gods, and not less a benefit and 
delight to godfearing men. Their abandonment of sacrificial 
practices is one of the allegations brought against the Chris- 
tians, while the Jews are praised aloud for adherence to the 
old rites \ Accordingly fixed days and hours were set apart 
for public sacrifice and prayer^. No less important in his 
eyes than regularity was reverential demeanour on the part Frag. Ep. 
of those present: he longed to see the service conducted with -a^w-sesD 
decency and quiet gravity: it was real pain to him to find a 
disorderly crowd rushing to the temples to catch a good sight 
of the Emperor, and receiving him it may be with vivas and 
plaudits that honoured the sovereign to the dishonour of the 
sovereign's God, He went so far as to deliver a public -"^iis- 344 c 
harangue against such desecration. The shortest and pithi- 
est of his surviving letters is the order addressed to the 
populace who cheered in the temple of Fortune : 'If I enter 
the theatre unexpectedly, cheer ; but if the temple, then 
keep silence, giving cheer to the Gods alone — nay, but the 
Gods have no need of cheers^' 

The whole rationale of reverence paid to temples, altars Idol wor- 
and images, he expounds very clearly. Between his view of ^ "^* 
the case and that of an enlightened Romanist at the present 
day, there is little sensible differenced He scornfully and 
indignantly rejects the supposition that the worshippers con- Frag. Ep. 
found the sticks or stones they reverence with the God whom 
these symbolise. Such a notion could emanate only from 
the addled prejudice of a Christian, Jewish denunciations 
of idols arise from pure misconception. Their prophets are 

1 Cyr. 299, 305-306, 351 d; cf. Sokr, m. 20. 

2 Soz, V. 16. 

^ Ep. 64. The play on exxjy-fjixiaL cannot be satisfactorily reproduced. 

* Mr J. Duncombe translating large portions of Julian in the last century, 
omits in his rendering of this Epistle those very pages of ' arguments equally 
futile and Jesuitical,' which alone Mr W. Nevins, the more recent Eoman 
Catholic translator, selects as haying the first claim upon his labours. 

8—2 



116 JULIAN. 

Fra,}. Bp. in reality like men who gaze through a cloud of mist upon a 
light perfectly serene and pure: then in their short-sighted- 
ness not discerning the purity of the light beyond, but 
beholding only the illuminated mist, they mistake the mist 
itself for fire, and screaming out Fire ! Murder ! Sudden 
Death! and such alarmist cries, set to work to extinguish 
what they suppose to be the devouring element. The true 
and reasonable use of images is very different. They are but 
294 c human handiwork ; they are not the Gods themselves, but 
symbolic representations of the Gods : material images of 
293 Bc deities who themselves are immaterial. Nay, they are ac- 
knowledsred to be an accommodation to man's creature limi- 
tations; it is man's bodily nature alone that makes them 
useful adjuncts of worship. Of the highest supreme Being 
no physical representation has ever been attempted. Even 
in the case of the second grade of deities emanating imme- 
diately from the first, all corporeal embodiment and service 
proved impossible ; for they are by nature unindigent of 
such, and can be approached only by more exalted spiritual 
communion. It is the third order of Gods alone that the 
service of images can propitiate, and thus in this third grade 
of worship only do they become effectual. But in their 
proper sphere they are to be commended and to receive due 
293 d honour: they become evidences of alacrity in worship: like 
294a other rites they have the sanction of antiquity: our fathers 
delighted thus to do honour to the Gods, in precisely the 

293 c same way as we delight to do honour to kings or princes by 

rearing statues or images to represent them. Thus images 

294 c are not to be regarded as mere bits of wood or stone, any 

more than they are to be confounded with the Gods. What 
they really are is simply what they set up to be, wood or 
stones representing, symbolising the Gods. As such they are 
entitled to reverence. A fond parent will take delight in the 
294 c D ii]jeness of his child; why? because it is stone? or because it 

^ Cf. Porph. De Abst. ii. 34. 37, who says that to the highest God, man 
must offer pure contemplation, to the intelligible Gods words combined with 
contemplation, to the Universe and the other Gods bloodless sacrifice and 
gifts as well as prayers. 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 117 

is bronze? or because it is his child? No, but because it is 
stone or bronze representing and recalling the likeness of his 
child. A loyal subject will honour the statue of his sovereign 
for precisely the same reason. Just as the parent loves the 
likeness of his child, or the subject honours the statue of his 
prince, so will the worshipper revere the image of his God, 
and in its presence realise in trembling awe the unseen pre- ^rag. Ep. 
sence in whose gaze he at that moment stands. True of 
course the Gods have no need of images ; neither have they 294 a 
any need of prayers. The need lies with the worshipper. 
It would be as reasonable to deny the Gods the service of the 
lips, that is prayer, as that service of the hands which comes 
to us with the sanction of thrice a thousand years and the 294 a 
consent of all known races. It is needless Julian thinks to 
refute the sorry argument of those who would discredit 
images by acts of wanton insult or destruction. It is they, 
not the image-worshippers, who are discredited by such exhi- 
bitions of folly and crime. A wicked brutal man can easily 295 a 
enough destroy the handiwork of a wise good man : that is 
all that is done. Even then there remain the living unefface- 
able images of the unseen essence of the Gods, even the im- ^^^^ ^p- 
perishable stars which 'from everlasting to everlasting run 
their courses in the heavens. 

This survey of Julian's position with regard to the exter- Ahsti- 
nal expression of the religious sense would be incomplete selection 
without a reference to his leaning towards observances which °f meats. 
are apt to be regarded as even more formal ceremonialism 
than any yet alluded to. He approved and justified ceremo- 
nial abstinence at stated seasons from certain kinds of food. 
This was a genuine part of his Neo-Platonic creed, in more 
than one branch of which Orphic influences^ are clearly trace- 
able. Plotinus had abstained almost entirely from meat, and 
seldom touched even bread : subsisted indeed on the scantiest 
diet that sufficed to support life, and recommended similar 
self-denial to his disciples^. One explanation of the name 



^ So again in the interpretation of myths : cf. Naville, p. 128. 
* Cf. the story of Eogatianus in Porphyry's Vita Plotini, c. vii. 



118 JULIAN. 

BaTav€(oTr)<i^ applied to Porphyry is that he was a vegetarian. 
ji/i».350c FolloAving in the same track, Julian, not content with him- 
self adopting sparse ^ if not vegetarian fare and fasting at 
appointed religious seasons, recommends to others the ob- 
servance of traditional rules about diet, and sees in them a 
genuine and permanent symbolical significance. He takes a 
oc. 5. 174 c D devout pride in the insight vouchsafed to him in these matters: 
but does not press his theories intolerantly. The rules are 
177 c for set times and certain persons, where the means, the 
physical condition, and the individual's will are favourably 
disposed. The benefit to be derived is primarily moral, and 
only indirectly physical. 'Purification'^ was a catch-word of 
Neo-Platonic Ethics: and soul being in itself perfectly pure, 
and every contamination derived from man's corporeal part, 
mortification, asceticism and fasting availed naturally for 
174pp. personal holiness. In his Oration to the Mother of the Gods 
Julian vents his opinions at length, prescribing minute dietary 
rules for the religious observance of the Cybelean ceremonial. 
With regard to vegetables, while cabbages, sprouts and the 
like were permissible articles of food, seeds and all roots such 
as turnips, were forbidden; while in the case of fruit, figs 
received the preference over apples, pomegranates or dates. 
Fish was prohibited, while birds of almost every kind were 
approved. Among four-footed beasts the swine attained an 
enviable monopoly of uncleanness. Julian proceeds to point 
out the underlying significance of these at first sight arbitrary 
restrictions. Seeds (except indeed the pods of leguminous 
plants whose manner of growth secured them exemption) and 
roots, no less than creeping plants, are forbidden as symbol- 
ising a grovelling earthward tendency, while vegetable shoots 
typify the opposite heavenward desire, always looking up- 
ward to the pure aether. The apple or rather probably the 
orange is too holy for consumption ; it recals the golden 

1 More probably as born at Batanea in Syria. ^ Liban. Epit. p. 579. 

3 waaa dperT] Kadapais. Plot. E7in. i. vi. 6, cf. ill. vi. 5, p. 308 A, and Zeller 
III. 2, p. 538, on Plotinus. Porphyrius (cf. Zeller 596 pp.) went even farther 
than Ms master, as may be read in his De Abstinentia, and lamblichus follows 
in his wake in the fragment irepl ^pvxvs, for which cf. Stob. Ekl. i. 1065 ff. 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 119 

apples of the Hesperides, and has served as the guerdon and 
symbol of mystic quests and triumphs. The pomegranate is 
interdicted as a ground plant ^j the sanctity of the date is 
perhaps a survival from Phrygia, birthplace of the Phrygian 
Mother's rites, where the palm grows not. But Julian rather 
descries in it the fruit sacred to the sun, and which never 
grows old. Fish are spared, first, in compliance with the 
general rule that that which is not sacrificed to the Gods 
is not to be eaten of men; and secondly, because they too 
diving down into the depths signify those lower grovelling 
desires which have been already attributed to the root -plants. 
Birds, on the contrary, who constantly soar, seeking the 
mountain-tops or the expanse of heaven, are fit food (except 
such as be sacrosanct to the Gods) for the soul that would 
aspire upwards. No wonder that the leprous pig is tabooed. 
He is pursy of habit, fleshly, gross : he cannot, if he would, 
turn his eyes heavenwards: he is fit only to be the victim 
offered to the nether Gods. The seriousness and manifest 
earnestness of the writer in tracing these rather droll symbol- 
isms^ remind the reader of works like the Epistle of Barna- 
bas, or later writers of the allegorical school with whom 
Julian had little enough of common ground. Quite consist- 
ently with this expression of his views, he lauds the rigidity 
of Jewish abstinence in the matter of meats clean or unclean, cyr. 314 c 
and denounces Christian laxity in this respect. It is to 
this apparently as much as to anything that he refers, when 
he charges the Christians with having abandoned the purer 
portion of the law, and retained all that was less edifying, cyr. 202 a 

^ xdivLov (pirov. I cTo not understand x^oviov. He alludes apparently to 
the fact of the pomegranate growing comparatively low, though to call it 
distinctly ground plant seems absurd. The other sense of x'^°vi.os, 'in- 
fernal,' is no more satisfactory, and the expression would moreover be ex- 
tremely bald if taken to mean a plant sacred to the infernal Gods. The 
pig is treated to the same epithet ; but it is not connected with the fact 
stated immediately after that he is used in sacrifices to the x^o^'t'o's deois. 

Apples and pomegranates had an amorous signification, and their avoid- 
ance was perhaps emblematic of chastity, though Julian gives more strained 
interpretations. 

2 In one or two Julian has probably the Jewish law in mind, which the 
Christians are sharply reprimanded for ignoring. Cyril 314 c d, 343 c. 



120 JULIAN. 

Elsewhere drawing a nobler contrast, he says that Pagan 
coldness and unbelief is put to shame by those who display 
Ep. 63. 453 D the burning zeal that would choose death rather than violate 
the law of holiness, and that Avould suffer hunger and starva- 
tion rather than eat of the flesh of swine, or of meat that 
had been choked or strangled. 
Outward Yet while thus insisting on the consistent and prominent 

ward^re- recognition of the value of externals in religion, Julian taught 
ligion. that these were after all secondary to that inner life and 
spirit of which they were but the outward expression. With- 
er. 7. 214 A o^^t holiness, he says, the hecatomb, aye and chiliomb as well, 
Or. 6. 199 B c, ^re waste only and nothing else. Sanctification of the soul 
Or. ?! 239 B c was the first supreme necessity, the alpha and omega of true 
philosophy. So completely did he recognise this, that he ex- 
plains and defends the avowed contempt expressed by Dio- 
genes the Cynic for the outward paraphernalia of worship. 
Or. 6. 199b 'If any detect atheism in his not drawing near nor minister- 
ing to temples or statues or altars, they are mistaken; none 
such did he use, neither frankincense, nor libation, nor silver 
wherewith to buy them. But if his heart was right toward 
the Gods, that and that only sufficed; for with his true and 
very soul he worshipped, giving them I ween the most precious 
of all things he had, the sanctification of his own soul by 
the thoughts of his heart.' Thus he obeyed the voice of the 
oracle within and wisdom was justified of her child. The 
mysteries as then conducted were one of those shams of cus- 
or. 6. 202 sq. tom agaiust which his whole life was a protest. It was his 
very reverence for the universal Gods and his desire for com- 
munion with them, that made him revolt against that narrow 
Or. 7. 238 b c exclusive ritualistic temper, that religious quackery which 
limited participation in the mysteries to citizens of Athens. 
This is a spirit so free and noble that only a chosen few can 
attain to it: for the mass it is safer and more laudable to fol- 
low obediently on the lines of religion laid down for them. 
Theurgy. Neo-Platonism sought also to catch converts by more 

questionable attractions, stored in the theurgic or super- 
natural department. These were more effective than unin- 
telligible mysticism, doomed to elicit from the masses nothing 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 121 

but impatience or blank bewilderment. On Julian's own 
mind they laid fast hold. Not only was belief in oracles, 
dreams, prophecies, augury and divination a constituent part 
of his faith, but the sorceries of the necromancer or spiritu- 
alist^ enchained him with their spell. But he never^ thrusts 
these forward as evidences of Paganism, nor in any single 
passage of his works adduces them either as corroborative of 
the existence of the Gods, or as inducements to convert the 
unbeliever. He appears to have felt the dangers of popular 
superstitions in these respects, to have endeavoured to extir- 
pate quackery in divination, and reduced the practice of it 
to a science, governed by revealed and rigid laws, and ad- 
ministered only by trained exponents. 

His dogmas and rules of conduct were further enforced Future 
by a doctrine of future retribution, not however very loudly ^*''**^'"'^- 
or prominently put forward. Holding fast in person the 
hope of immortality, allowing that hope as a motive to effort, Or. 7. 234 c 
and confronting with a resolute denial those who believed 
that the soul's life was as frail or frailer than that of the 
body, he a,cknowledges that the life to come is veiled in 
mystery, known to the Gods but unrevealed to man : ' men sp. es. 
do well to conjecture, the Gods must know.' The retributive 
punishment of vice commences in this life ; for if not all, at or. 5. irs c 
any rate most, and those the most virulent, diseases are the 
result of spiritual aberrations or delinquencies ^ The child- or. 7. 229 a. 

™ . S^ Cf. ad Ath. 

lessness of Constantuis Julian regards as a distinct dispen- ^^i a 

1 Amm. M. xxix. i. 29 minutely describes processes that furnish a singu- 
larly close parallel to some forms of modern table-turning. Neo-Platonist 
references to levitation, materialised apparitions, &c. are constant. lambli- 
chus, for example (Eunap. Fit.), is credited with eliciting from the springs at 
Gadara a living Eros and Anteros, incarnate in boyish forms. The effect on 
his followers was striking : ' they believed everything ' (iraffLu iirla-revoi'). 

2 His arguments on the Mysteries and temple-worship generally in Or. 6. 
199 and Or. 7. 238 are purely defensive, and in these places he does not 
touch on secret magic arts. 

^ In the fragment of the letter to Photinus (preserved from Facundus 
of Hermiane and numbered 79 in Hertlein) Julian attributes to divine 
retribution the bodily emaciation, the pallor and the sunken features which 
Diodorus the Bishop of Tarsus owed in part to prolonged asceticism, and in 
part to advanced consumption. 



122 JULIAN. 

Frnt]. Kp. satioH of DivinG displeasure. After death sinful souls will be 

3U0fl . . . ^ 

imprisoned in the darkness of Tartarus ; but * the pit itself 

does not lie outside the omnipotence of God, for God knoweth 

even them that are fast shut up in Tartarus,' and them that 

draw nigh to him with godliness he will deliver. But Julian 

loves far more to dwell upon the brighter side, to hail death 

as the entering into rest^, and the cessation of the long con- 

298 D, 299 A. flict, as tlio Separation of body from spirit, which will then 

car.t 33fi c bo remitted to the Gods from whom it came, and fare trust- 
or. 6. IbO c 

fully forth under guidance of its tutelar deity; or he will 
picture the heaven which is reserved for the souls of the 

Or. 4. 130 A D righteous, or tell of Hades the gentle beneficent God, who 
sets souls free for the communion for which they pine. When 
the conflict is all ended, he writes impressively, and the im- 
mortal soul set free, when the dead body is turned to dust, 

Frap. Ep. then will the Gods be potent to make good all their promises 
to men ; and we know of a surety, that great are the rewards 
which the Gods give unto their priests for a possession. The 
immortality to which he taught men to aspire was not a 
continuance, but rather an entire change of being to a new 
and more perfect state which can at present be only spiritu- 
ally imagined. Indeed, notwithstanding fugitive expressions 
of an opposite character, Julian did not believe in personal 
immortality. He rejected the Christian doctrine, in favour 
of the Neo-Platonic supposition of pre-existent emanation 
before life, and subsequent re-absorption into the ocean of 
divinity. He held no doctrine of the resurrection of the 
body, an idea absolutely alien to the Neo-Platonist. His 

0;-. 4. 152 a convictiou of life after death was resolute; but the individual 
life was merged in a higher life, assimilated by kindred and 
divine essence : the emanative soul was once more absorbed 

158 *'^^^^' ^^ ^^® spiritual order determined by its own choice and bias 
in mundane life ; unless it passed by self-determination into 
other congenial phases of material connexion ^ The one 

' 7l<rvx^o. 6 dduarSs icrriv. Ep. 77. 

^ Transmigration of souls was a genuine Neo-Platonic tenet. lamblichus, 
following Porphyrius, denied the transmigration of human souls into brutes 
or lower orders, though Plotinus imposed no such disabilities. 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 123 

Tartarus of physical suffering on which Julian dwells is of or. 5.178 c, 
this earth : the horrors of alarmist myths are flatly discarded : ' ' 
when the souls of the righteous are translated to the presence 
of Serapis the unseen ^ Hades the mild and placable ab- 
solves them absolutely from the bonds of created being, and or. 4. ise b 
at their enfranchisement does not fasten them to other 
material forms^ as vehicles for chastisement and retribution, 
but conducts and elevates them to the sphere from which 
they were derived. There the separated souP is affiliated to 
the inseparate essence with which it is most homogeneous. 

Towards alien philosophies Julian adopted the normal Attitude 
attitude of the Neo-Platonist. First of all with some charac- *^f.f * 

I'lnloso- 

teristic inexactness of thought he strove to identify them all, pMes. 
all at least which he approved. Herein later Neo-Platonism 
followed the same bent which it displayed in identifying all 
the shifting forms of Paganism, and evolving theoretic mono- 
theism from a ferment of active Polytheism. Here is Julian's 
superficial generalisation: 'Truth is one and philosophy is Or. 6. i84 c d, 
one ;. . .all philosophers had one single end, which they reached isg a 
by different paths :. . .the tasks of Plato and Diogenes were not igg c 
different, but one and the same ;...wh3'- should we erect par- 
tition walls, and separate men conjoined by love of truth, isqa 
disdain for populax prejudice, and aspiration after virtue?' 
By this route Stoicism is hut a fonn of Cynicism, and hoth i85c-i86a 
of Platonism. At the same time minuter differences were 
partially recognised, and two philosophies at least were de- 
nied a place in the goodly company. The Neo-Platonist 
estimate of philosophies corresponds very closely to the ap- 
preciativeness displayed by them towards current religion^ 
Epicureanism was the most open and bitter foe of Paganism, 
Scepticism a less violent but as insidious an opponent, Stoic- 

^ diSyj : punning on the name Hades ("At5??s) with whom by oracle Serapis 
is identified. Or. 4. 136 A. 

2 fiepLOTT) ipvx^ is the normal term employed of the individualised souls 
or portions of soul, which animate matter, and are the second essential 
element in the compound nature of man. Supr. p. 87. 

3 As traced in the Introduction to this Essay, § 2. 



1 24 JULIAN. 

ism a friendly neutral, Platonism and Pythagoreanism bold 

Epicure- and ardent supporters. To Epicureanism accordingly Julian 

I'cepti.'^"^ never gives one kind word. To refer the creation or genera- 

cisvi. tiou of the material world to the impulse of blind uncaused 

forces in accordance with the Epicurean theory, he accounts 

the redicctio ad absurdum of a philosophic system. Epicurean 

ad Them, moralitv likewise with its scientific selfishness and apathetic 
255 B c . . •' . -"^ 

indifference he condemns most strongly ; while as for the 

dogmatic teaching of Epicureanism and Pj^rrhonism alike, he 

Fraij.Ep. tliauks God that nearly all the treatises of these schools have 

301 c _ _ "^ 

Stoicism, perished. Stoics on the contrary he treats with modified 

adThcn. approval. While criticising their doctrine of happiness, he 
admires their stern self-control and self- denying virtue ; this 
he could to the full appreciate, and regarded with no less 
admiration the deeply religious sentiment which pervades 
their greatest masters' teaching on the Gods. He even re- 

Frap. Ep. commouds extracts from Zeno and Chrysippus as useful 
devotional manuals for priests, notwithstanding that some of 
their professed opinions were dangerously heterodox or im- 

caes. 309 moral. In the satirical Ccesars Zeno finds admission and 
patronage in heaven, where no Epicurus or Pyrrho may 
enter. Octavian there makes his appearance, his colour 
changeful as the chameleon's, now pale, now red, now black 
and dark and lowering. Silenus jocosely suspects that there 
is mischief in the beast, but Apollo rebukes him with these 
words, ' Hush ! nonsense, Silenus ! I will consign him to 
Zeno's charge and will forthwith make of him pure gold. 
Come, Zeno,' said the God, ' take my child in charge.' Then 
Zeno hearkened to his bidding, and sang over him catches 
from the dogmas, like the incantations of Zamolxis, and 
made him a wise good man. 

Cynicism. Much that attracted Julian in Stoicism was present also 
in Cynicism\ The sixth and seventh Orations are a full expo- 
sition of Julian's views on Cynicism true and Cynicism false. 
As a rebound from the utilitarianism and insincerity of those 
about him, its self-abnegation and reality laid hold of him 

^ Their close affinity he dwells upon in Or. 6. 185 c— 186 A. 



IDEA OF RELIGION. 125 

with peculiar force. With all its defects and one-sidedness, or. 6. 194,195. 
its mistakes as to the true nature of happiness, and its 
failure to acknowledge the real claims and needs of soul as 
opposed to body, it yet remained a worthy monument of 
genuine philosophic zeal. For the poor self-deceptions and 
the low worldliness of his own day, no better physic could be 
prescribed than the old Cynic maxims of self-knowledge and 
war against all shams. Tvadi aeavTov — irapa-^^^dpaTre to-O?-. a iss 
vofiicr/jiaTa — Know thyself — Down with convention — let men 
guide their lives by that twin rule, and brighter days would 
dawn for all. In true Cynicism, though least of all in that 
base counterfeit of the original which did but ape the out- 
ward ugliness of the Silenus mask and contained no God, Or. 6. m b 
Julian recognised a stalwart protest for the truth, more 
articulate than speech. Such Cynicism was an acted creed, 
a sermon written in the life, Julian reaches the very bounds 
of praise when he declares the genuine Cynic to be a kind of 
incarnate Platonism. Indeed Julian was himself, if the term Mis. 338, 339. 
may pass, a rationalising Cynic; latitudinarian enough to 
reject its eccentricities and indecencies, though viewing them 
not without tendernesSj but faithfully following the principles or. e. isi d, 
of the school as adapted to his own times and position, and 
repudiating the extravagance which disparaged all book- 
learning as compared with the practice of virtue. 

The Peripatetic philosophy is rated higher than any of Aristotle. 
the preceding. On the moral side Julian considers that it 
has hardly received full justice as compared with Stoicism. 
In one of his letters, after quoting an Aristotelian adage, 
' Better a brief span of right, than a life-time of wrong,' he Ep. 17. 386 a 
adds, ' Whatever people may say the Peripatetic teaching is 
as high-souled as the Stoic. The only difference is that 
Peripateticism is less habitually cool and prudential, while 
Stoicism commends itself permanently to the intelligence of 
its disciples.' But intellectually, if not morally or theologi- 
cally, Aristotle stands side by side with Plato ; in a brief Ep. 55 
note to two fellow-students Julian urges them to concentrate 
their efforts on the doctrines of Aristotle and Plato, to make 
them 'the base, the foundation, the walls and the "roof of 



126 JULIAN. 

all knowledge. But with all this exalted respect for Aristotle he 

Or. 5. 1C2 D dares criticise and at times reject Peripatetic teaching, as well 

Plato. as compare it eclectically with other systems. For Plato such 

criticism or comparison, even by way of commendation, were 

an insult : far better strain an interpretation or distort an 

argument, than correct an error, or acknowledge a defect. 

I Plato is an infallible guide. He is quoted, lauded, imitated 

I in almost every treatise Julian wrote. His i2)se dixit is 

absolute. He is the perfect seer, standing on the pinnacle 

of truth, the sure guide for this world and the next. lam- 

blichus himself cannot soar higfher than to be an alte?' Plato. 



CHAPTER VI. 

Julian's personal religion. 



0St6s iarij' 6 /leplaas airov tov jSiov el's re ras vivkp rCov !}\o}V 
3ovKds el's re ras vepl roiis ^u/xoiis Starpi/Sas. 

LiBANIUS. 



It will be useful to supplement the last chapter by some Julian's 
details of Julian's own personal religion. This will serve in f g[L7o^,_ 
some measure as a test of the sincerity and efficacy of his 
teaching, and also exemplify its working. In the main he 
strove conscientiously to carry out the ideal which he set 
before others. Eecognising the grand truth that increased 
opportunities imply increased responsibilities, he endeavoured 
in imperial measure to perform the duties of a private indi- 
vidual. As a citizen he had been liberal to the destitute; when, Fm^. sp. 
in days of comparative poverty, his grandmother's estate, long 
forcibly withheld, was at length secured to him, of his little 
fortune he gave ungrudgingly to those in greater need than 
himself: raised later to princely powder, his alms must be 
princely. It is almost with despair that he contemplates the 
accumulated responsibilities of an emperor. He numbers up 
the virtues that are required of the man, whose highest func- mis-usch 

-, , o ^ • 1-j. -^'^' Them. 

tion it IS to be the servant not the ruler oi his subjects: 261 a 
modesty and sobriety, gentleness and goodness, humility and 254 a, 
patience, impartiality and conscientiousness, unswerving jus- ^^^^^g^'^ 
tice and philosophic foresight ; these and a thousand others, ^p- ^^- ^^^ ^ 
and coupled to them all, an entire self-abnegation ready to 
forego every indulgence, to shake off all sloth, and to make 
the whole life a sacrifice to others' welfare : and then as he 
thinks of the mountainous heaps of abuses everywhere rife, he 



128 JULIAN. 

w! Them. cries out in half-despair that it is verily a Herculean task 
thus throughly to purge earth and sea of prevalent vice, and 

258 A sq., that the true king must in sober reality, as Plato has fabled 
and Aristotle reasoned, be no man but a demi-gud. Yet 

Self-din- tremblingly conscious of the magnitude of his task, he 

''""*''• faced it bravely. Not, it may safely be said, without stern 

Mis. 352 D "^ > J J » ^ 

ad Them, cffort. Early and late, in 363 A.D. no less than in 356 or 
414 D.' ''' ■ 361 A.D., he confesses the shrinking reluctance with which he 
entered upon power. His lonely frostbitten boyhood pro- 
duced an acute, not to say morbid sense of personal defici- 
ad Them. oucies. This was only partially removed by his collegiate 
■ education: it continued to paralyse energies as yet untested 
and therefore undeveloped. He shrunk instinctively from 
254 B active life ; he mapped out for himself the student's career, 
sino-insf Attic tales to solace the ennui of existence \ The 
Epicurean maxim 'Live and let live"'^' seemed life's best 
Or. 7. 230 A motto. There were moments when suicide appeared the 
adAth.2~5A readiest solution of unhappiness. On leaving Athens for the 
Csesarship he wept 'fountains of tears.' One letter of that 
£p. 53 epoch or earlier is preserved. It is addressed to the philoso- 
pher lamblichus and closes thus dejectedly: — 'Do thou re- 
main at home, and fare thou well, and never forfeit the peace 
thou now enjoyest; we for our part, we will bear with forti- 
tude whatever God may dispense; for good men ought, they 
say, to cherish hopefulness, and do their duty while they 
follow destiny.' The last phrase is eminently true to his 
ad Them, frame of mind at the time. He seemed fortune's toy; she 
for good or for evil was mistress of man's acts and destinies. 
He accepted provisionally a Stoic idea of dut}^, but accepted 
it perfunctorily: for Stoicism with its summons to action, 
perseverance, fortitude for their ow^n sake, with its arbitrary 
definitions of happiness, with its reversal of all ordinary 
standards of success looked to him a bleak disappointing 
25fiA-c, cf. creed invented to disguise the failures of its best exemplars. 
Had not Cato failed, and Dion failed ? At the moment when 
the insignia of pomp were conferred, there rose to his lips the 

1 Ad Them. 253 b, 262 d. Cf. Liban. Epit. p. 527. 
' /3taicrai/ra Xadelv, ad Them. 255 b. 



PERSONAL RELIGION. 129 

line of Horner^, that on its prey 'purple death lays hold and 
mastering fate.' The burden of his constant presentiment 
was that now 'he should die busier^.' 

But no sooner was power in his hands, and he by short Ene'>-gy 
trial made conscious of his real aptitudes for command and ™"'^'^' - 
influence, than these nightmares passed away. Now or never 
was the time to justify his old boast, to give the lie to those jsp. 35. 4ioc 
who assumed that good philosophers must be indifferent 
citizens, and to show that even a student might be cast in a 
'princely and courageous' mould. It would be travelling too on 2. 86 b 
far aside to depict the young Csesar as soldier, combining 
dash with prudence, shaming cowardice, regenerating disci- 
pline, inspiring devotion in his friends and terror in his foes; 
or to review with any fulness his exploits or mistakes as 
legislator, as administrator, as economist, as judge, as orator 
or as student; but the moral gist of his whole bearing as 
Csesar and as Augustus claims some summary. 

No stress need be laid on his easier excellences, manli- Seif-for- 
ness, courage, generosity, fidelity to friends, and such like : ^^j^^^ "*' 
they belonged to the man, and were little affected by his 
creed. — Of his more strictly moral virtues the most striking is 
his unselfish, untiring devotion to work. At the close of his 
first year of power he pictured the virtuous prince as one 
'laborious and of capacious mind, allotting their proper tasks or. 2. 86c 
to all, reserving for himself the largest share, but without 
reserve distributing the rewards of peril among the workers.' 
Five years later his panegyrist^ speaks thus: — 'Our most vir- 
tuous emperor spares nothing to make us live as our station 
demands, abounding in all things needful, leading chaste 
but cheerful lives. Other emperors have been either chafed 
by hard work or enervated by sloth. The strenuous have 

failed in graciousness, the gracious in earnestness Our 

emperor spares himself no trouble and no fatigue ; but exacts 
neither from his friends. His toil secures others' leisure. 
He is the dispenser of wealth, the eager recipient of cares, 

^ ^XXaSe Trop<pijpeos Bavaros Kot (xolpa ffparatTj. Horn. II. v. 83 in Amm. M. 
XV. viii. 17. 

2 Amm. M. xv. viii. 20, ^ Mamert, 12. 

R. E. 9 



130 



JULIAN. 



Julian's 
Motives, 

Or. 2. 87 c 
Mis. 354 B 



Kindli- 
ness. 



Frag. Ep. 
2^1 A 



Or. 2. 86 B c 



readier always to discharge the most irksome offices in person 
rather than impose them upon others.' But testimonies^ to 
his indefatigable self-denying industry are too common to 
multiply; the more as it will appear abundantly in the sequel. 
Physical weakness^ renders this elastic energy the more ad- 
mirable. The motive which impelled him was partly a high 
Neo-Platonic sense of duty and religion; partly a deep con- 
viction of the power of his example, as it is written in Plato, 
'Rulers and elders must practise modesty and temperance, 
that the people may see and be beautified:' partly too, it is 
just to add, an intense love of applause, degenerating at times 
to vanity, wilfulness and egoism ^ Another characteristic of 
Julian was kindliness: it is prominent both in public and 
private relations. One striking instance of leniency was his 
treatment of Constantius' adherents, who were about him 
when proclaimed Augustus: at that critical hour he neither 
committed nor allowed a single execution, though more than 
one declared personal enemy was in his grasp*. Few usurpers 
of the Empire could say the same. It is hardly less rare to 
find an autocrat pleading for clemency of treatment to pri- 
soners in gaol previously to sentence being declared: to the 
innocent it is a due; to the guilty it will do no harm. Most 
victors would agree with Julian in the policy of relentlessly 
pushing and harrying a foe till he acknowledges defeat, but 
not all, of his age not many, would have seriously called it 'a 
pollution' to strike or slay the enemy who asks for quai-ter. 
But his gentleness appears not only in lenient treatment of 
enemies, nor only in the general indulgence of his rule, and 
his affectionate solicitude for the welfare of his subjects®, but 
quite as prominently in more personal relations: in courtly 



1 For instance Amm. M. xvi. v. 4 — 6 : and in war even more than in 
peace. 

2 In his private letters it is by no means uncommon to find Julian suffer- 
ing from severe indisposition. Cf. Eji. 44, 48, 60. 446 d — 447 b. Cf. Ad 
Them. 259 d. 

3 See Semisch, p. 19, who well quotes Amm. M. xxii. vii. 3, xxv. iv. 18. 

* Schlosser, a hard critic, selects this for special praise. Uebersicht dcr 
Gesch., &c. III. ii. p. 337. 

5 Cf. Mis. 345—6, Or. n. 86, Eutrop. x. 16. 



PERSONAL RELIGION. 131 

deference towards officials*; in affability towards councillors, 
with frank acceptance of wise rebukes ; in devotion to 
teachers, such as Maximus, Libanius, lamblichus; in grati- 
tude to benefactors, such as Eusebia; in private life, as for 
instance in the kindly letter, by which he hopes to console the Ep. 37 
bereaved Amerius for the loss of a young wife: the news had 
'filled his eyes with tears.' But natural lenity did not shove 
justice aside. Julian was just, yet not afraid on occasion to Justice. 
temper justice^. Rigidly exacting of proof, he presumed 
innocence till guilt was substantiated. When an angry ad- 
vocate, baffled in his indictment, cried impatiently, ' Can any 
one be found guilty, if denial is to clear him?' Julian 
promptly responded, 'Can any one be found innocent, if asser- 
tion is to convict him^?' He aimed at being 'slow to condemn, Ep. e 
but slower still to relax a sentence once given*.' Moreover 
an habitual earnestness armed him with great power of 
righteous indignation at acts of unjust oppression. At no 
small risk he m.anfully shielded the provincials from the 
exactions of Florentius, a prefect appointed in Gaul by Con- 
stantius. Hear his own words ^ to his private friend and 
physician: 

' He thought to implicate me in his own infamy, by sending 
me his knavish infamous memorials for signature. What was I 
to do 1 hold my peace or show fight ? The first was a feeble, 
cringing, debasing course ; the second was honest, manly, and free, 

though circumstances made it inconvenient Was I to 

abandon an unfortunate population to the mercy of thieves, or to 
the best of my ability defend them, reduced as they are to the last 
gasp by the villainous machinations of rogues like him 1 To me 
it appears cruel injustice to put military tribunes on trial for 

1 Mamert. 28, 30, with which cf. Amm. M. xxii. vii. 1, 2. 

2 For instances, cf. Amm. M. xvi. v. 12, 13. 

3 Amm. M. xviii. i. 4. 

4 Amm. M. xxii. ix. 9. ille iudicibus Cassiis tristior et Lycurgis, causarum 
momenta aequo iure perpendens, suum cuique tribuebat. In xxii. ix. 9 — 12, 
XXII. X. and other passages referred to on p. 186, notes 1, 2, 8, may be found 
corroborating testimony. 

^ Eip. 17. The official is not named ; Heyler and others following Petau, 
insisting on a particular term of abuse (tov fuapov avSpoyvvov), suppose the 
eunuch Eusebius is alluded to, but La Bleterie seems more right in referring 
the account to Florentius, concerning whom cf. Ep. ad Ath. 280 a, 282 c sq., 
as well as Amm. Marc. 

9—2 



132 JULIAN. 

leaving their post, to punish them with immediate death, and re- 
fuse them burial ; and then myself to desert my post as champion 
of the unfortunate, when called on to fight against thieves like 
these, and that too with God, who gave me my commission, con- 
tending on my side. — Well, if it should turn out ill, it is no 
small consolation to have a good conscience for a companion.' 

The Virtu. Thus as a ruler he sought to be a faithful shepherd of the 
ous Prince, fjock entrusted to him. He regarded a-oxhooavvn as essenjtial 

Or. 2.86 D ^ , , , ^ /' ' , . 

to the true monarch, and he gave to tiie term a dauntmg 
comprehensiveness. By his definition it included 'conscious 
active subjection to the Gods and the laws\ frank recognition 

iifw. 343AB of the claims of equals, courteous acknowledgment of superior 
merit, watchful precautions against class oppression, with 
constant readiness to brave prejudice, passion and abuse; all 
this moreover with unruffled resolute composure, disciplining 
and controlling every passionate impulse.' It included too 
'abstinence from questionable pleasures of all kinds, even 
from those tolerated by an elastic public opinion, in the con- 
viction that private personal indulgence is the sure outcome 
of public laxity and frivolity.' 

Chastity. It is time now to inquire into his more inward practice 

of virtue and beliefs. First then his personal chastity stands 
above reproach. No Christian writer^ has impugned it, 

1 This is well illustrated by Aimn. M. xxii. vii. 2. 

2 Contemporary or ancient writer I mean, for moderns have been found 
less charitable. The best, La Bleterie, Gibbon, Lardner, De Broglie (with 
some qualification), as of course Miicke, Semisch, Mangold, Eode, &c., clear 
Juhan of all incontinence. Tillemont it should be said takes an opposite view. 
Auer's more vicious attempt to blacken Julian into a false husband and 
a treacherous assassin by ransacking the fathers, by adopting everywhere 
the unkindest construction of passages, and by adding hyjaotheses of his own 
as prurient as they are baseless, deserves no detailed refutation. Not con- 
tent with hinting that Julian was the author of Constantius' death, and 
asserting that he was the father of bastard children, he does not even spare 
the reputation of Eusebia, and wantonly asperses the pure and (to both) 
most creditable relations that existed between the gentle empress and 
Julian. Cf. Auer, Kaiser Julian, ii. §§ 4, 5, 6. Lam6, be it said by the way, 
makes quite sure (p. 69) that the gifted Eusebia designedly ' set her cap ' at 
the taking and gifted young student, in preparation for the eventuality of 
Constantius' death. Nothing can be added to the data discussed by La 
Bleterie on Misop. 345 c, and De Broglie, iv. p. 51 n. Briefly, if the most 
unfavourable interpretation be put on ws kirlwav of Mis. 345 c, the broad 



PERSONAL EELIGION. 133 

while Pagans with one mouth extol even if in some cases 
almost deprecating it. 'Purer than a Vestal' is the descrip- 
tion of Mamertinus, while Libanius and Ammian^ are to 
modern reserve indelicately precise in their emphatic ac- 
quittals of Julian from all frailty: to Zonaras he seemed 
unnaturally fastidious. In Julian's own eyes personal purity 
was a part of that entire subdual of the flesh, which his 
philosophic creed inculcated. When first introduced to the Personal 
highest mysteries of Neo-Platonism, he was told that such ^'^^"' * ^' 
were the ecstatic revelations reserved for the initiated, 
that he would shortly blush to own the nature and name 
of man. He should be like Plotinus, who would neither 
hear nor make mention of his parents, his country or his 
birth; who replied to the disciple who desired his portrait, 
that it was enough to bear the image in which nature had 
veiled us, without perpetuating it for posterity. Julian was 
a humble follower in the same track. Not only did he prac- 
tise strict continence, and abstain from the frivolities of the 
theatre and the exciting or bloody spectacles of the amphi- 
theatre with resolute determination, but in his private life 
practised a strict asceticism. Abstemious in diet, stinting 
himself of sleep, rejecting downy coverlets for the coarse 
carpet rug and palliasse, he guarded against the first ap- 
proaches of effeminacy^; in the hardest winter he went 

irony of the whole piece disarms it of strict evidential value. As to the 
curious notice of ' his children's nurse ' or ' attendant ' (d rpocpevs) in Ep. 40, 
■417 c and Ep. 67, it is probably a pleasantry to which the clue has been lost. 
Some, e.g. Lardner, have supposed the Traldes or iraiSia to mean slaves, or to 
refer to certain children adopted or at least cared for by Julian. This is 
more plausible than the impossible supposition that they were bastard 
children elsewhere unmentioned and unknown. At the same time it can 
hardly be right. The rpocpeus is on both occasions engaged in the irrelevant 
occupation of travelling about the empire : and on both occasions has letters 
in charge : in fact he turns out to be a confidential courier or postman. 
The children whom he ' nursed ' were an Athene offspring of Julian's own 
head, his epistles to philosophers. This gives a tangible force to the ifiavrov 
both times repeated (tQv efiavrov waidiuv — twv ifjiavrov iralSajv) which the 
other alternative denies it. [La Bleterie's idea that the Tpo<f>evs was husband 
to the midwife who attended at Helena's unhappy confinement some six 
years previously is desperately far-fetched.] 

^ Amm. M. xvi. v, xxiv. iv. 27, xxv. iv. 2, 3. 

2 Mis. 340 B c, Liban. Epit. p. 579, Amm. M. xvi. v, 4, 5, &c. 



134 JULIAN. 

j»//>. 341BC without fires: striving in every way by constant discipline of 
the flesh to follow out those precepts of Plato and Aristotle 
which from childhood he had imbibed. 

Belief in His religious life demands a closer scrutiny. The first most 

dence' noticeable trait is his ever-present belief in an overruling Pro- 
vidence. ' For it is against all reason,' he writes, ' that a man 
who commits himself wholly to the Almighty should be dis- 

o>: 8. 249 a regarded of him and left utterly desolate: rather, God shelters 
him with his own arm, endues him with courage, inspires 
him with strength, teaches him all he ought to do, and deters 
him from all he ought not to do.' Like professions recur 
again and again in the pages of his writings. They appear in 

ofi ^^/i. 2T6 A. his state manifesto to the Athenians. Human wisdom, he 
tells them, is powerless to change the past or foretell the 
future : even for the present it is not infallible, and may be 
content with a comparative exemption from error. But the 
far-reaching wisdom of the Gods, with its omniscient gaze, 
knows and does always what is best; for the Gods themselves 
are the authors of the future no less than of the present. 
To their guidance men may entrust themselves without re- 
serve. The same belief is reiterated till it becomes a common 

i»f?>. 352 D, place in his devotional works. It meets us in his Satires. 

And perhaps no religious thought recurs more frequently in 

his private correspondence. Writing immediately after the 

i^p- 13 death of Constantius to his uncle Julian, he says that all his 

actions had been prompted by an immediate impulse from 

the Gods: he had been but a passive agent in their hands : 

had the issue been put to the stake of a battle-field, he 

should have trusted all to fortune and the Gods, awaiting 

such issue as might seem good to their love. To the provi- 

Ep. 44 dence of the all-seeing God he attributes his falling into sick- 

Ep. 66 ness, no less than his recovery from it. From Him comes all 

Ep. 27. success and all disaster. The saying * Deo volente ' glides as 

naturally into Julian's correspondence as into the letters of a 

modern Christian. 

Fatalism. Not unfrequently indeed this present sense of an over- 

or. 7. 232 d ruliug Providcnce is exaggerated into a kind of semi-Fatalism, 
from excesses of which however Julian's masculine good sense 



PERSONAL RELIGION. 135 

preserved him. He speaks of conduct 'regulated not by vir- ^g"^^^'"- 
tue only nor resolute free choice, but far rather controlled by 
an ever-ruling fate constraining the bent of action to its will.' 
Once again dwelling on the active power of fate, he quotes 
with approval the dictum of Plato, which in his own experi- 257 d 
ence he has found true — ' God is all things, and with God's 
help fate and circumstance control all human action.' In 
this connexion, for the sake of the insight it gives into 
Julian's religious life, it will be useful to cite long extracts 
from the allegory^ in which Julian has described the phases 
or crises of belief which he passed through. Nothing could 
show more vividly how completely Julian regarded himself 
as an instrument in the hands of the Gods, from whom he 
had derived an altogether special mission. 

Having portrayed . Constantino under the image of an AutoUo- 
unscrupulous rich man^, and described the scenes of disorder ^^lUgory. 
and crime that ensued upon the distribution of his vast 
wealth to his unworthy heirs, he represents Zeus and Helios 
taking counsel together to counteract the mischief and im- 
piety that had resulted from the insolent pride of these heirs. 
A consultation with the Fates results in the weaving of a 
new thread of life for Julian. 



" Then Zeus addressing himself to Helios says, ' Behold this or. 7. 
young child ; kinsman though he is, nephew of the rich raan of ^^'^' 
whom, we spake and cousin to his heirs, he is just flung aside in 
utter neglect ; yet is this child thy ofispring. Swear then by my 
sceptre and thine, that thou wilt take him in special chai-ge, wilt 
tend him and heal him of his sickness. Thou seesfc how he has 
been as it were begrimed with smoke and filth and soot^j and that 
the flame which thou hast sown in him is in danger of being 
quenched, unless thou gird him with strength. To thy charge I 
and the Fates do commit him. Take him hence and nurture 
him.' Thereat King Helios was glad and took pleasure in the 
babe, seeing yet alive in him a tiny spark of his own fire, and 

1 It forms a part of Orat. vii, levelled against the Oynic Heraklius as his 
penalty for mis-allegorising. 

2 The opening ' A rich man had many flocks and herds and droves of 
goats ' looks like a direct imitation of 2 Sam. xii. 2. 

' The reference is to Julian's Christian training. 



13G JULIAN. 

from that day forth lie nurtured the young child, and withdrew 
him 

From blood and the war-din and slaugliter of men. 

And father Zeus bade Athene too, born without mother and ever- 
virgin goddess, aid Helios in the nurturing up of tlie tender 
child. Now as soon as he was nurtured and come to youth's 
estate 

With the down on his chin, and in youth's fresh bloom, 

when he surveyed the multitude of wrongs that had been wrought 
upon his kinsmen and his cousins, his impulse was to fling himself 
down to Tartarus in horror at the magnitude of those wrongs. 
But of his good grace Helios and Athene of Providence cast him 
into the slumber of a deep sleep and banished that design ; then 
when he had awaked he went into a wilderness. Now it came to 
pass he lighted there upon a st-one, where he rested for a space and 
considered Avith himself how he might escape the throng of all his 
woes: for so far everything looked to him untoward, and there 
was no good thing anywhere. Then Heimes, whose heart was 
wholly towards him, appeared to him in the form of a young man 
as one of his associates, and accosted him affectiouately and .^aid, 
* Come hither, and I will guide you along a smooth and more level 
track, as soon as you have surmounted this little space of crooked 
broken ground, where every one, as you see, stumbles and then 
makes his way back again.' Then the young man turned and set 
forward very warily. Now he had with him a sword and a shield 
and a lance, but his head was still quite bare. Trusting to his 
guide he pixshed forward by a smooth unbroken path, beautifully 
clean and teeming with fruits, and many goodly bhissoms, such as 
the Gods love, and with shrubs of ivy and bay and myrtle. 

So he led him to a great and tall mountain, and said, ' Upon 
the crest of this mountain sits the father of all the Gods. Take 
heed therefore : here is your great peril : first worship him with all 
reverence, then ask from him whatever you desire ; raayest thou 
choose, my son, that which is best.' When he had said these 
words, Hermes hid himself again. Now he would fain have in- 
quired of Hermes what thing he ought to ask of the father of the 
Gods ; but when he did not see him near, he said, His counsel 
was good, though incomplete. Let me therefore with good suc- 
cess make entreaty for the best gifts, though I do not clearly 
behold as yet the father of the Gods. ' O father Zeus, or by 
whatsoever name thou delightest to be called, point me the way 
that leadeth upwards to thee. For yonder regions where thou 
dwellest are incomparably beautiful, if I may divine their beauty 
that is at thy side from the pleasantness of the path which I have 
already travelled.' When he had prayed thus, there fell upon him 
a kind of sleep or trance. And the God showed him Helios him- 
self Then the young man, astonished out of measure at the sight, 



PEESONAL EELIGION. 137 

exclaimed, ' To thee, O father of the Gods, in return for these and 
all thy other gifts, I offer and consecrate myself.' Then casting 
his hands about the knees of Helios, he laid hold of him and be- 
sought him to be his saviour. Then Helios called Athene, and 
bade her first examine the arms that he carried. Now when she 
saw the shield and the sword and the spear, she said, ' But where, 
my son, is your segis and your helmet?' Then he made answer, 
' Even these I had work to procure ; for in my kinsmen's house I 
was despised and flung aside, and there was no man to be my 
helper.' ' Know therefore,' said great Helios, ' that thou must 
assuredly return thither.' Then the youth entreated him not to 
send him thither again, but rather keep him ; otherwise he should 
certainly never return again, but perish of the ills he suffered 
there. And as he besought him importunately with tears, the 
God said to him, ' Nay, you are young and uninitiated. Get you 
therefore to your own folk, that you may be initiated and dwell 
there in safety : for you must go hence and purge away all those 
iniquities, praying for aid to me and to Athene and to the other 
Gods.' As soon as the young man heard that, he stood still in 
silence. 

Then great Helios led him to a certain eminence, whose top 
was full of light, but the lower parts of fold on fold of mist, 
through which the light of the brightness of King Helios pierced 
dimly as through water. ' Do you see,' asked the God, ' your 
cousin who hath the inheritance?' 'Yea,' said he. 'And yonder 
herdsmen too and shepherds '? ' Once more the yoiuig man an- 
swered in the affirmative. ' What like, pray, is he that hath the 
inheritance 1 and what like are the shepherds and herdsmen 1 ' 
The young man made answer, ' Methinks he is sodden with sleep, 
and keeps himself close and is given over to pleasure : and the 
dutiful Shepherds methinks are few, for the most are bad and 
brutal. For they both devour and sell the sheep, and so do double 
wrong to their master. For they destroy his flocks and bi'ing in 
small returns from ample means, and grumble for wages and make 
complaint. And yet it were better to secure their wages in full 
than to destroy the flock.' ' Suppose that I and Athene, at the 
behest of Zeus,' said Helios, 'were to make you steward of all 
these in the room of him that hath the inheritance 1 ' Then the 
young man clung to him once more, and besought him greatly 
that he might remain there. But he said, ' Be not very rebellious, 

Lest the excess of my love be turned to the fierceness of hatred.' 

So the young man answered, ' Most mighty Helios, and thee 
Athene, and Zeus himself, I do adjure, do with me what ye will.' 
After this Hermes, suddenly re-appearing, filled him with new 
courage, for now he thought he had found a guide for his return 
journey, and his sojourn on earth. And Athene said, 'Listen, 
most goodly child of mine and of this good sire divine ! This 



138 JULIAN. 

heir, yovx see, finds no pleasure in the best of his sliepherds, while 
the flatterers and rogues have made him their subject and slave. 
Consequently the good love him not, while his supposed friends 
wrong and injure him most fatally. Take heed therefore when 
you return, not to put the flatterer before the friend. Give ear, 
my son, to yet a second admonition. Yon sleeper is habitually 
deceived ; do you therefore be sober and watch, that the flatterer 
may never deceive and cheat you by a show of friendly candour, just 
as some sooty and grimy smith by dressing in white and plastering 
his cheeks with enamel might finally induce you to give him one 
of your daughters to wife. List now to a third admonition. Set 
a strong watch upon yourself : i-everence us and us alone, and of 
men him that is like us and none other. You see what tiicks 
self-consciousness and dumb-foundering faint-heai'tedness have 
played with yonder idiot.' Great Helios here took up the dis- 
course and said, ' Choose your friends, then treat them as friends ; 
do not regard them like slaves or servants, but associate with 
them frankly and simply and generously ; not saying one thing of 
them and thinking something else. See how distiust towards 
friends has damaged yonder heritor. Love your subjects as we 
love you. Let respect toward us take precedence of all goods : 
for we are your benefactoi's and friends and saviours.' 

At these words the young man's heart was full, and he made 
ready thei-e and then to obey the Gods implicitly always. ' Away, 
then,' said Helios, ' and good hope go with you. For we shall be 
with you everywhere, I and Athene and Hermes here, and with 
us all the Gods that are in Olympus, and Gods of the air and of 
the earth, and all manner of deities everywhere, so long as yoii are 
holy toward us, loyal to your friends, kindly to your subjects, 
ruling and guiding them for their good. Never yield yourself a 
slave to your own desires or theirs. And nowj- besides the armour, 
in which you came hither, take this torch from me for your 
journey, that even on earth its light may shine mightily before 
you, so that you will desire nothing upon earth ; and as fair 
Athene's gift take this segis and helmet, for she has many another 
gift, you see, and she gives to whom she will. Hermes likewise 
will give you a golden wand. Go therefore furnished with this 
armour, over land and over sea, stedfastly obeying our laws ; and 
let none, neither man nor woman, nor friend, nor stranger, per- 
suade you to neglect our precepts. So long as you cleave to them, 
you will be dear and precious to us, reverenced by our good ser- 
vants, and the terror of miscreants and evil-doers. Know that 
your poor body hath been bestowed on you for this service ; for 
from respect to your fathers we will cleanse you your father's 
house. Remember therefore that your soul is immortal and born 
of us, and that if you follow us you shall be a god, and with us 
shall behold our father.' " 



PERSONAL RELIGION. 189 

The last words of the extract emphasize Julian's belief in immor- 
immortality. This has already been discussed, but it will be ^'^^^^z- 
pertinent to remark that his personal belief was more than a 
dim transient hope, useful to grace a philosophic period, and 
remained with him unshaken, his solace in the hour of death. 
When the fatal wound had been received, and Julian faint 
with loss of blood and conscious of approaching death, lay in 
the tent amid the sorrowing throng of friends and comrades 
who surrounded the bedside, he addressed them all. The 
time of departure he said was at hand : like an honest debtor 
he must render back to nature the life that she had lent. 
Death he could face with joy "rather than sorrow, remember- 
ing that it was the most precious gift of the celestial Gods to 
pious souls. He had nothing to repent of, and no wilful 
wrong to regret : alike in the obscurity of youth and in the 
exercise of sovereign power he had striven to keep his hands 
unspotted with crime. The tranquillity for which he had 
long yearned would now be his; that thought filled him with 
an almost exultant joy. He had long foreseen his end : none 
could be more happy or more glorious. As he had been 
ready to live, so he did not fear to die. His strength was 
ebbing fast. His latest prayer was that a virtuous ruler 
might be found to succeed him. During the brief span of 
life that yet remained, he discoursed with Maximus and 
Prisons on the exalted nature of the soul, till at midnight the 
gush of blood came which painlessly set him at rest. In spite 
of philosophic affectation, and a characteristically Pagan self- 
complacence, it is hardly gross exaggeration to say that his 
death was * not only, like that of Sokrates or Marcus Aurelius, 
resigned and dignified, but full also of faith and hope and 
spiritual exaltation and passionate yearnings for his celestial 
abode \' 

Throughout the whole of the above extract stands promi- Gommu- 
nently forward Julian's pervading sense of intimate personal ^^^^ '^'^^ 
communion with God. ' Though I tremble before the Gods,' or. r. 212 b 

1 Lamd, Jul. VApost. p. 193. The MJichristian aspect of it is admirably 
given in a passage well worth perusal in Newman's Idea of a Univ. p. 194. 
Amm. M. xxv. iii. 15 — 23 is the one prime authority. 



140 JULIAN. 

he elsewhere writes, 'and love and worship and hold them in 
awe, yet alway and in all things do they deal with me as 
gentle masters, as teachers, as fathers, as my own kin, yea, 
in all things it is always so.' The same trait manifests itself 
in his earnestness and regularity in prayer, which reappears 
often quite incidentally at most of the great crises of his life. 
When summoned from Athens, to the throne or the scaffold, 

adAth.2i5A lie scarce knew which, he relates how he lifted up his hands 
to Athene's consecrated mount in passionate entreaty that 
she would not desert nor betray her suppliant, but suffer him 
if it might be even to die in Athens. Once more, in Gaul 
when the sound fell upon his ears of the voices of soldiers 

act ^<;(. 2S4 c proclaiming him Augustus, there in the upper chamber he 
fell upon his knees in prayer to Zeus, and called upon the 
God not unavailingly to guide him by a sign. And it was so 
in the small crises no less than in the great. He would con- 
stantly rise at midnight and in secret pray to Hermes, the 
God of sound judgment, as the best preparation for his official 
duties on the coming day\ 

Julian's As a specimen of Julian's prayers, it cannot be wrong to 

piayei. q^ote the supplication with which he concludes his address 
to the Mother of the Gods : — 

0)\ 5. 179— ' Mother of Gods and men, consoi't and partner in the throne 

of mighty Zeus, Source of the Intellectual Gods, thou who farest 
ever with the xmdefiled essences of the Intelligible Gods, who 
receivest from them all the common soui-ce of being and dost 
transmit it to the Intellectual Deities, life-bearing Mother, thou 
Wisdom and Providence and Creatress of our Souls, thoxi who 
lovest great Dionysus, who didst succour Attis when exposed, and 
didst raise him again after his descent into earth's cavern, thou 
who dost minister all blessings to the Intellectual Gods, and satis- 
fiest with all things the sensible Universe, who givest to us all 
things alway good, vouchsafe to all men happiness, whereof the 
chiefest element is knowledge of the Gods : grant unto the Roman 
people at large, first and foremost to wipe off the stain of atheism, 
and next thereto grant also that favouring fortune may guide the 
helm of state for many thousands of years ; and to mine own self 
vouchsafe as the fruit of my service toward thee, truth in my 
views about the Gods, perfectness in theurgic art, and in all 
things, to whatsoever ta^ks of peace or war I lay my hand, virtue 

^ Amm. M. xvi. v. 5, and cf. Liban. Epitaph, i. 564. 



180. 



PERSONAL RELIGION. 141 

and happy fortune, and to the end of this life peace within and a 
fnir name without, with a good hope for the journey that shall 
bring me to the Gods.' 

One letter is interesting as showing Julian's belief in Interces- 
intercessory prayer : it is that to the Jewish Council, where ^°^Jyg^ 
remarking that in the press and worry of business princes Ep. 25 
had but brief leisure to pray, he begs that public supplica- 
tions may be offered in his behalf for God's blessing and 
guidance in the affairs of state. 

His punctilious regularity at public worship^ is so cha- Attend- 
racteristic a trait of his life as to deserve renewed emphasis. loorsUv 
It was a part of that scrupulousness in all religious matters <*<^- 
which is stamped on every portion of the religious revival 
which he led. It provoked the amusement of friends and 
the derision of enemies. He is at pains to justify it more 
than once in his own writings. But he does not make it 
sufficiently clear, how far it was as a devout layman, and how 
far in his imperial character as high priest that he admitted 
and fulfilled obligations of worship. It was his custom to 
offer public sacrifice morning and evening^ He erected a 
shrine to the sun within the palace walls : he ' initiated and 
was initiated.' When he and his little philosophers' clique oi Mis.ziic 
seven came to Antioch, they went nowhere at all, ironically 
writes the ringleader, but to the temples, and just now and 
then by detachments to the theatres. ' He divided his life 
between political occupations and service about the altars^.' 
So prodigal were his sacrifices that the people of Antioch 
nicknamed him ' the Slaughterer*.' During his campaigns 
he endeavoured to secure the attendance of the soldiers at Ep. 38. 415 c 
these celebrations. Such a practice, on the authority of a 
trustworthy historian, was not without its abuses : the mul- 
titude of oxen and smaller cattle, not to mention birds, offered 
almost daily by Julian was such, that according to Ammian 

1 Soz. V. iii. 2, Liban. Ad lul. Hyp. 394, 395, Manod. 509, &e. 

2 Ep. 27. 401 B, corroborated by Liban. Epit. i. p. 564, Ad. lul. Hyp. 
p. 394. 

3 Lib. vepl Tifi. 'loifX. § 22, p. 56. 

* Amm. M. xxii. xiv. 3, Zonar. xiii. 12. 



142 JULIAN. 

his troops, more particular 1 1/ the Petulantes and the Celts^, 
gourmandized so freely on the victuals and drink thus libe- 
rally furnished, that many of them had to be carried home to 
their quarters on the shoulders of bystanders. The supply of 
animals threatened to run short : the witty epigram com- 
posed against another philosopher emperor could not but 
recur to the minds of the spectators : 

We the ■white biills bid Marcus Cassar hail ! 
Win but one victory more, our kind will fail - ! 

Perhaps it was no wonder that Julian found his soldiers very 
jVis. 346 B religiously disposed ! Here is the ironical description of his 
conduct, put in his own mouth in the Misopogon : ' The Em- 
peror, to be sure, offered sacrifice once in the temple of Zeus, 
again in that of Fortune, and then marched off thrice run- 
ning to Demeter's. For I have lost count of the number of 
times I resorted to the shrine of Daphne, that august fabric 
which the negligence of its warders betrayed, and the pre- 
sumption of the atheists demolished. The Syrian kalends 
are here, and the Emperor is off again to Zeus Philios; then 
comes the state festival, and with it the Emperor on his way 
to Fortune's precincts : and no sooner is the one fast-day 
over than he is once more paying his vows to Zeus Philios.' 
Ep. 27 His letter to Libanius descriptive of his doings during the 
opening days of the Persian expedition reads like the ac- 
count of a religious rather than a military campaign. So 
great was his conscientious, but dispiriting waste of energy! 
It amounted to a nervous excited assiduity ill calculated to 
express contained and restful piety, induced it has seemed 
to some^ by misgivings rather than fulness of conviction. 

1 Amm. M. xxii. xii. 6. The toiTch is graphic, and may be looked upon as 
an ' undesigned coincidence ' confirming the general statement. Ammian 
here writes as an eye-witness. 

' oi /36ei ol \evKol MapKus to; Kaiaapi xa^/OetJ'. 

av irdXi viKyjaris, Afx/ies airuikoixeda. 
Quoted Amm. M. xxv. iv. 17. The lohite hull is the particiilar sacrifice 
specified in Ep. 27. 399 d as offered to Zeus at Bercea : it was the recog- 
nised triumphal sacrifice. 

3 Mangold, Jul. der Ahtr. 21. 



PERSONAL RELIGION. 143 

His religious activity found another vent in proselytizing Julian's 
efforts. He employed not merely example, nor only the ob- 1*™®^^!/*^^" 
vious indefinable methods, which thickly strew a monarch's 
path, of making new converts, but active preaching and ar- 
gument as weir, and not less, if occasion served, ridicule or 
sarcasm, or even hard cash. Perhaps the most sterling wit- 
ness is his elaborate work against the Christians, which occu- 
pied so many of his long winter nights, and remained to the 
death of Greek Paganism the text-book of Pagan evidences ; 
but the tale of his relations with Csesarius will illustrate it 
more graphically^ Success had smiled upon the accom- 
plished Csesarius from early youth. He was the brother of 
Gregory of JSTazianzus, and seems to have shared his talents. 
Medicine was the profession he had chosen. Of a brilliant 
address, and a singularly ready kindness, the young physician 
was soon the darling of Constantinopolitan society. He was 
well known at court, and on Julian's accession, like other 
Christians, received a share of his favours. In spite of the 
apprehensions and adjurations of his brother Gregory, the 
young doctor, stout Christian as he was, did not decline the 
Emperor's advances. Anxious to gain such a convert, Julian 
one day, before the assembled court, held a set conference 
lasting several hours. Not till all arguments were exhausted 
on either side, and Csesarius still declared, ' I have been, I 
am, I will be a Christian,' did the Emperor desist with a 
good grace from his self-imposed task. In like manner he 
harangued the leading men of Antioch on their remissness, mis. 363 
and delivered a religious address to the Council at Beroea ; Ep. 27. 399 d 
but on neither occasion apparently with much happier effect 
than in the case of Csesarius. Of less generous proselytizing 
attempts, if such they were, notice will be taken presently. 
Finally, what has been happily called his 'pastoral' corre- 
spondence, a unique phenomenon amid the despatches of 
Roman emperors, shows the living interest and force he 
spent in the effort to inoculate others with his own beliefs 

1 Liban. Epit. pp. 562, 578. 

2 The Btory may be gathered in the main from Greg. Naz.'s Seventh 
Oration, which is a funeral panegyric on Cassarius. Cf. too Greg. Ep. 7. 



144 JULIAN. 

and aspirations. Borrowed as it was from Christianity, the 
idea of thus grafting a fruitfid Church hfe on the stock of 
Paganism, is JuUan's best chxim to originahty, if not to great- 
ness. In the close union he assumes between rehgion and 
politics, he becomes the precursor of a Louis IX. or a Crom- 
well. He persuades us almost against ourselves that he 
quite believed, and believed in, his own creed. 

One last noticeable trait is Julian's faith in the various 
sources of communication between God and man. It serves 
to show the weaker and more superstitious side of his cha- 
racter and his religion. He was a genuine disciple of lam- 
blichus' credulity\ which is only the more debased by its 
veneer of philosophy. His admirer Ammian, himself far 
from a complete rationalist in these matters, numbers it 
among his faults, and compares him in this respect to the 
Emperor Hadrian ^ 
Oracles. Oracles he regarded with implicit reverence^ as due to the 

Or. 4. 152 D direct agency of Apollo. In his works their utterances are 
quoted with credulous respect, as decisive in most questions 
of philosoj^hy or theology. One instance of his curiosity and 
pertinacity in consulting oracles was his attempt to disinter 
the sources of the Castalian fount near Antioch. The power 
of these waters had first communicated to Hadrian his future 
accession to the throne. To prevent any repetition of the 
prophecy to other applicants, Hadrian choked the fountain 
mouth with masses of stone; the subsequent interment of 
Christian martyrs hard by had further hallowed, or dese- 
crated, the spot. Julian's solemn exhumation of these with 
Prophe- purificatory rites led to issues anything but oracular. Pro- 
phecies again he reverently accepted : nor did he regard them 
as a lost privilege of former ages^ By his own account he 

1 Zeller, m. 2. 630 pp. 

^ Amm. M. xxv. iv. 17. No better comment on the gist of this allusion 
could be given than Julian's own description of Hadrian in the Ccesars. 
There he is introduced (a little sarcastically of coui'se) 'with a flowing 
beard and a confident mien, an expert in music and all the arts, ever 
and anon gazing on the heaven and preoccupied with strange secrets.' 
Canars, 311 d. 

^ Theod. HI. x. 1. * Amm. M. sxi. i. 



eies. 



PERSONAL RELIGION, 145 

received distinct predictions both of Constantius'^ death and 
his own^ As soon as he heard that the place where he 
lay wounded was named Phrygia, he knew that the wound 
would be to death; for an oracle (as usual true in letter, 
and misleading in spirit) had predicted he should die 
there. Such soothsaying power he attributed to denizens 
of the spirit world, over whom Themis presided^. But cyr. i98 c 
both prophecies and oracles were rather irregular and 
intermittent than ordinary channels of Divine communi- 
cations. Inspiration had spoken most clearly in the past, 
and the day of seers was wellnigh gone. Oracles yielded 
so to say at periods of time, lying fallow in the interim. 
Their place was supplied by omens and sacred arts, skill Omens. 
in which was derived from divine illumination. To these, 
whether given by divination or by augury, or by other 
means, he yielded willing credence*, seeing in them a merci- 
ful gift of the Gods. The philosophical basis on which to 
his mind the art of divination® rested, was that adopted by 
the Platonists of the preceding century. Auspices® are not 
gathered from the will of silly birds ; but the kindness of the 
deity governs their motions and their cries in such a way as 
to make them significant to those who can read the sign: 
ultimately they depend upon the sympathetic unity of the 
whole universe which is secured by the all-pervading activity 
of the central world-soul. Divination obtained a new lease 
of popularity, and the emperor was constantly attended by 
soothsayers, augurs, and interpreters of dreams ^ At the same 
time he did not suffer himself to be weakly dismaj'ed by 
superstitious fears ; he was unfeignedly pleased if Zeus 
favoured him with gracious signs®, or if by happy omen the 
garland from some triumphal arch fell and rested on his 

1 Ep. 17. 384 B c. Of. Lib. Epitaph, p. 561. Amm. xxi. ii. 2. Soz. v. 1. 

5 Amm. M. xxv. iii. 9 and 19, xxiii. iii. 2, 3. 

3 Amm. M. xxi. i. 8. * Liban. Epit. p. 582. 

5 In his work against the Christians he defends the propriety of divina- 
tion and preferences of method by Scriptural quotations and arguments. 
Cyril 343 e, 347, 356 c, 358 c— e. 

6 Cf. Amm. M. xxi. i. 9, 10. 

^ Amm. M. xxi. ii. 4, xxii. i. 1, xii. 7, xxiii. iii. 3 and v. 10, xxv. ii. 7, 8. 
** Ep. 27. 399 D, and cf. the stories in Amm. M. xxiii. iii. 6, v. 8. 

K. E. 10 



14G JULIAN. 

head\ but gaily discarded less auspicious presages, or showed 
a felicitous readiness in construing favourably omens which 
at first sight might seem adverse. When, after his proclama- 
tion as Augustus, during martial exercises at Paris his shield 
of a sudden broke leaving nothing but the handle in his 
grasp, he reassured the dismayed bystanders with the prompt 
interpretation, 'Let no one fear: I hold fast what I held 
before ^' He would boldly defy auguries when in conflict 
■with his better judgment : as Ammian^ phrases it, 'he thought 
it unadvised to put faith in forecasts, that events might 
falsify.' In the Persian war, when the Etruscan diviners were 
for ever seeing stars and discovering unpropitious portents, 
' the emperor fairly struck against the whole science of vatici- 
nation^' On the eve of his expected conflict with Constantius, 
as Julian was mounting his horse, the soldier who was help- 
ing him to the saddle suddenly slipped and fell. ' See,' cried 
the Emperor, 'he has fallen who raised rne to my present 
elevation^' As his army marched through Illyria, though 
vintage time was past, unripe grapes hung still upon the trees. 
Boding hearts prognosticated for Julian marred hopes and 
premature death; but to him the unswelled clusters spoke 
only of fortunes still to ripen^ If in the prepared entrails a 
cross appeared surrounded by a ring', Julian interpreted it 
not as the circle of eternity, but the emblem of circumscrip- 
tion that enwreathed the symbol of Christianity. Here too 
consciously or unconsciously he adopted the teaching of 
Maximus. That gentleman, when Julian's invitation to court 
reached him, at once consulted the auspices : on these 
turning out villainously unfavourable Maximus observed to 
his fellow, the alarmed and chagrined Chrysanthius, that it 
was the lesson of a life-time 'not to succumb to the first 
repulse, but if need were to take the kingdom of heaven by 

1 Sok. III. i. 29, Nikeph. x. 1, &c. 

2 Amm. M. xxi. ii. 2. ^ j^j ^^jj^ j 2. 

4 lb. XXIII. V. 10, 13, XXV. ii. 8. 

5 Amm. M. xxii. i. 2. The story of the fall of Julian's horse ' Babylon ' 
Amm. M. xxiii. iii. 6 is in spirit exactly similar. 

6 Soz. V. 1. 

1 lb. V. 2, Greg. Naz. Or. iv. liv. p. 577 b. 



PEESONAL RELIGION. . 147 

violence^.' Perseverance triumphed: Maximus' persistent 
efforts were rewarded with success; and presently to court he 
went. Is it something of this sort that Libanius means, 
when he speaks of Julian in the Persian war being 'his own 
Pythia'? His boldness in this respect is credible enough 
when we read of the rebuff he laid upon an unconciliatory 
God. Outside Ktesiphon^ one of ten bulls offered to Mars 
the Avenger had the independence to break his bonds, resist 
his sacrificers, and finally after death display most unfavour- 
able omens; therefore Julian swore to let Mars go without 
victims for the future, and faithfully kept his word^ 

Magic rites and the paraphernalia of Neo-Platonic theurgy Theurgy. 
exercised from the outset a strange spell of fascination over 
Julian's mind. Christian theology of the fourth century 
probably enough familiarised him with belief in the existence 
of angels and a hierarchy of demoniacal powers 1 His teachers 
laid hold of these conceptions. 'The nature of daemons and 
of the beings who formed and preserved this universe' was 
his introductory lesson in Neo-Platonism^, mystic intercourse 
with familiar spirits his constant occupation and delight^ 
Maximus was the representative of this charlatan department 
of philosophy, and to his dying breath Maximus remained 
his most trusted friend. Apparitions, coming as mysterious 
visitants from the spirit world, thrilled and attracted him 
with a vaffue irresistible awe. We read^ how he went down 
to subterranean caverns to face the summoned spectres; yet 
how when they stood before him, the sign of the cross invo- 
luntarily made scared them away. Such tales may well have 
a foundation in truth. It is as likely that shrewd sorcerers 

^ fiT] irdvTics eiKew rots irpwrois air av t "ri fiacnv , dXX' e^/3tafe(7^at Trjv tov delov 
<j>vaLv. Eunap. Vit. Max. ^ Amm. M. xxiv. vi. 16. 

3 Lam^, Jul. VApost. p. 195, in the fictitious death-bed discourse with 
which he has supplied Julian, explains this as a patient acquiescence in the 
wiU of the Deity. The God was not to be pestered with inquiries to which 
he had already vouchsafed a plain response. 

4 Cyril 224 e, cf. Naville, pp. 80—82. 

5 Lib. Epit. 528. « Lib. jrepi rt/i. 'lovX. § 22 p. 56, Presb. p. 460. 

7 Greg. Naz. Or. iv. Iv. p. 577. Soz. v. 2. Idle rumour no doubt pro- 
pagated secrets which assuredly neither Julian nor Maximus would have con- 
fided to Christian ears. But rumour does not always largely err from truth. 

10—2 



148 JULIAN. 

contrived the show as that Christian historians invented it. 
Ep. 38. 416 B In Julian's remains the direct allusions to mystery worship 

and theurgic practices are rare. He treats the matter with 

reverent reserve, as unsuited to popular exposition. When- 
or. 5. 173 A, ever he does mention it, it is with a worshipful approval that 

speaks volumes. Without theurgic instruction God's prophets 
Fra,,. Ep. and spokesmen cannot attain to excellence. Theurgy makes 

295 D, Or. 7. ^ n r- 1 • 1 • 

219 B. ijian divine; it is the way of perfectness, which in prayers 

for divine guidance comes prior to every kind of outward 
gifts or successes. 

Dreams. In the numerous references to direct communications 

from the deities to himself, dreams appear to have been 
the ordinary channel. What the sign {Tepa<;) was\ by which, 
at a sudden crisis and in open day, the Gods in answer to 
prayer directed his conduct, on his soldiers proclaiming him 
Augustus, we cannot tell ; but it was by a dream that heaven 

ad Ath. 275 c warned him against sending an imprudent letter which 
he had composed to the Empress Eusebia : and in a dream 
that the shining figure communicated the warning which 
foretold the death of Constantius. In one letter where 
he expresses a strong belief in revelations by dreams, he 
Ep.n recounts to his friend Oribasius a vision foreshowing his 
own rise and the imminent death of Constantius. We are 
not surprised to find this particular prediction recurring more 
than once in various forms I The final and most detailed 
version of it occurred at Vienne, on the eve of Juliati's final 
march against Constantius. He was in a state of grievous 
indecision, sorely troubled at the thought of civil war, when 
in the night watches a form of superhuman splendour stood 
before him and pointed to the stars, and recited in Greek 
hexameters these verses': 

^ Lam^, Jul. VApost. pp. 108—117, alone is in the secret, and describes 
with every minutia the room, the preparations and the prayers of Julian, 
together with the appearance and utterances of the Gods. De Broglie, 
L'Eglise, die, iv. p. 81, treats it as the waking vision of an ecstatic enthusiast ; 
of. Ep. ad Ath. 284 c, 285 a with Amm. M. xx. v. 10. In Epitaph, p, 579, 
Libanius talks of his beholding Zeus visibly at midday (cf. Presb. p. 460), 
and this loan. Mai. Chron. xiii. p. 327 embellishes appropriately. 

2 Amm. M. xx. v. 10, xxi. i. 6, cf. xxii. i. 2. 

3 The dream is given in full, with iinimportant differences, by Zos. in. 9, 
Zonar, xiii. 11, Amm. M. xxi. ii. 2. 



I 



PERSONAL RELIGION. 14^ 

Wlien Zeus the Waterer's broad domain invades, 
And Kronos thrice eight tracks across the Maid's 
Hath drawn, lo Asia's land shall mourn her king 
Sweet life to churlish death surrendering. 

A not less famous dream ^ is that whicli intimated his own 
approaching death. Julian dreamed that a young man, 
dressed in consular attire, met him in a tent near Ktesiphon, 
in a place called Rhasia, and wounded him with a spear. 
When he received his fatal wound, Julian asked those about 
him 'What is the name of the place where my tent is set 
up?' On receiving the answer 'Rhasia^,' he exclaimed, 
'Sun, thou hast undone Julian!' 

^ Chron. Pasch. i. p. 581. 

' 'Asia' in Magnus and Eutychian and cf. loan. Mai. Chron. p. 327, 
while Amm. M. xxv. iii. 9, supported by Zon. xiii. 13, gives Phrygia as the 
name. In xxv. ii. 3, 4 he recounts other portents which warned Julian of 
impending death. 



CHAPTER VII. 

JULIAN'S ADMINISTRATION. 

" ductor fortissimus armis, 
oonditor et legum, celebenimus ore manuque, 
consultor patriae, sed non consiiltor habendae 
relligionis, amans tercentum milia divom. 
perfidus ille Deo, quamYis non perfidus Urbi." 

Peudentius. 

Julian's When Julian on his march from Gaul first puhlicly an- 

Apostasy. ^ounced his apostasy, and took the title oiPontifex Maximus^, 
men paid small heed to the avowal. Technically he was but 
Csesar still, and not Augustus : and at least he had a Chris- 
tian colleague and superior to hold his zeal in check. The 
declaration was assumed to be a political stratagem, and 
nothing more. Men's politics in those days made them Arians 
or Eusebians or Anomoeans, and by the same token Pagans 
as well. Even as a political move its dexterity was ques- 
tionable. Licinius forty years previously had done the same 
thing. In his final rupture with the Christian emperor, he 
had used the name of the 'Gods of our fathers' as an effective 
war-cry. Licinius' discomfiture before the father was a poor 
presage for Julian's success against the son. But when 
Julian sole Julian's proclaimed apostasy and march into Illyria was fol- 
Emperor. Jq-^^^j ^j Constantius' sudden death ^ at Mopsukrenae, and 
the young pretender stood alone at the head of Empire, 
Christians must have watched anxiously, and bethought them 

1 Sok. in. 1. 

* Apart from ingenious combinations and inferences, and that ' reading 
between the Hnes ' which he recommends to the student, Dr Auer's elaborate 
attempt to fasten the guilt of Constantius' death on Juhan rests solely on 
the on dit to which Gregory of Nazianzus is pleased to give his approval. 



ADMINISTRATION. 151 

of the days^ when they groaned beneath a Galerius or a 
Maxnnin. In spite of Constantius' cunning suppressions, 
and free fabrication of lying despatches, the sound of Julian's 
exploits, and the praises of his troops had ere now traversed 
East and West alike. The cause which had seemed forlorn^ 
was, without one blow, triumphant. People might be ex- 
cused for ascribing his triumph to the direct intervention of 
God, or — the Gods. 

His earliest care was the funeral of his illustrious prede- Constan- 
cessor. It was conducted with becoming pomp of royal and quies. 
Christian ritual ^ The entire army joined in the procession, 
and multitudes of citizens thronged without the gates of Con- 
stantinople to meet the imperial cortege. The emperor him- 
self as chief mourner took part in the procession, wearing 
the purple, but with the diadem reverently removed from 
his head. So with night-long chants, amid the blaze of 
torches and the homage of multitudes, the corpse was 
brought to its own chosen resting-place in the Church of the 
Holy Apostles. The death of Constantius took place on Duration 
Nov. 3, 362 '; the obsequies were completed in the same j{/^^''''"'^ 
month. The latest recorded law of Julian belongs to the 
middle of March 363 A.D., when he was already moving east- 
ward on his Persian campaign. Thus the period of his legis- 
lative and administrative activity as sole Emperor is confined 
within narrow limits of less than a year and a half. And 
though, according to La Bleterie, no Emperor made so many 
laws in so short a reign, his legislation is not alarming in 
bulk. It is our business in the present chapter to examine 
it, more particularly in its bearing on Julian's attitude to- 
wards the religions of his day. 

-- The earliest acts of the young Emperor were reassuring. Beligious 
A religious amnesty was proclaimed \ Bishops, orthodox or <^^"«s*2/' 
heterodox, were recalled from banishment, and no doubt 

1 Liban. Epit. p. 562. ^ Amm. M. xxi. Tii. 3, xxii. ii. 3. 

3 PhUost. VI. vi, Greg. Naz. Or. v. 16, 17, pp. 158—9, whom Liban. 
Epitaph, pp. 561, 562 corroborates. 

* See Appendix B, Note 5. 

5 Eufin, I. 27, Amm. M. xxii. v, cf. Sokr. ii. xxxviii. 23, iii. i, xi. 3, 
Soz. V. 5, Theod. iii. 4, Philost. vi, 7, vii. i. 



152 JULIAN. 

reinstated in their sees if vacant ; heretics of all shades were 
invited to return from exile. The breadth of his toleration 
has been manufactured into an accusation : he has been 
abused for recalling not only the orthodox bishops, but also 
suffering Arians, Semi-Arians, and Novatians to flock back 
unhindered, and even rehabilitating Donatists* and Circum- 
.cellions in the political rights of which j)receding Emperors 
had deprived them. For such a course it is easy to impute 
sinister motives ^ but it would have been a breach of prin- 
ciple to penalise opinions, and most certainly a hard matter 
to draw the line between their civil and their dogmatic 
offences ; restitution of their rights was the most equitable 
course, leaving it perfectly open to any one to prosecute the 
heretics for any criminal misdemeanour. Julian, no doubt, 
had the political sagacity to leave Arians and Catholics and 
Sects to fight out their own quarrels, but it is unfair to make 
that the motive of his policy of toleration. Invitations to court 
were addressed not only to Neo-Platonists and Pagans, but 
to Prooeresius the Christian professor, to BasiP, whose piety 
and learning already marked him out as bishop designate of 
C^sarea, and to Aetius* the Arian, subsequently bishop of 
Constantinople. Nothing could be fairer than the monarch's 
Ep. 12. professions of tolerance : nothing warmer than his letters of 
invitation. Basil is to come 'as friend to friend^'; to stay as 
long as he pleases, and as soon as tired to be sent on his way, 

^ Aug. Contr. Petil. ii. c. 83 and 92, Optat. ii. 16. 

^ Cf. Buf., Philost., Sok., Soz., Theod. as just cited, and Amm. M. 
XXII. 5. De Broglie's remark (L'Eglise, &c. iv. 133 pp.) that Julian always 
took the side of the sectaries against the Catholics is plausible, and, if only 
we had the sectaries' side of the question as weU, would be weighty. 

3 Basil had as early as 358 adopted the life of a recluse on the Neo- 
Cffisarean hills. Called to deacons' orders in 360, in protest or sorrow at 
the heresy of Dianius he once more retired to his sequestered monastery, 
where Julian's invitation must have reached his hands. La Bleterie denies 
on grounds of style the genuineness of all the reputed letters from JuHan to 
Basil, or vice versa. In the case of Ep. 12, no particular objections are 
intimated, and none are patent. It is generally regarded as the one genuine 
letter surviving from Julian to Basil, the Great Basil. De Broglie, iv. p. 205, 
Eode, p. 62. 

^ Ep. 31, Soz. V. V. 9, Nikeph. x. 5, &c. 

* Julian quotes playfuUy from Plat. Mencx. 247 c. 



ADMINISTRATION. 153 

where he will : both he and Aetius are allowed to travel at 
the state's expense. In fact Julian's court was to be of an Ep. 12 
entirely new model. Wise councillors and skilled admin- 
istrators should be his courtiers. Titles of servile respect 
were to disappear^ : hypocrisy, envy and sloth to be replaced 
by the candour of outspoken friendship and the energy of 
beneficent co-operation ^ 

■ But in his desire for peace Julian did not weakly overlook Chalcedon 
criminal offences. He appointed a commission^ to investigate ^ligsion. 
and chastise the official misdemeanours and crimes of the late 
reign. It was composed of Mamertinus and Nevitta, consuls 
for 362, of Arbitio an ex-consul of known severity, of Agilo, 
and of Julian's own master of the horse Jovinus. Over these 
presided Salustius praetorian prefect, and in the ensuing 
year Julian's colleague in the consulship. Cases of spolia- 
tion were investigated, prompt restoration enforced, and 
where reparation was impossible, severe penalties inflicted. 
No elevation of rank secured immunity. The infamous fa- 
vourites of Constantius, the tribes of informers who had 
thronged his court, were among the earliest victims*. Euse- 
bius, the Chamberlain, as prime instigator^ of the murder of 
Gallus, expiated his crimes on the scaffold. Apodemius, the 
vile aerent who had concerted the death both of Silvanus and 
Gallus, was burned alive ; Paul, the infamous notary, sur- 
named 'the Chain,' a kind of Titus Gates, shared the same 
cruel fate. More innocent victims also fell, or suffered banish- 

1 Mis. 343 SeffTTOTT/s, sc. dominus, on wMch La Bleterie's note in loc. is 
interesting. 

2 Or. vn. 233 a c. Cf. Liban. Epit. p. 585, Presb. p. 455. Not tliat 
Julian was by any means unsusceptible to flattery wben rightly couched. 
Far from it ! 

2 Amm. M. xxii. 3 gives the fullest accounts of its proceedings: cf. 
Liban. Epit. p. 572. 

* In Ep. 25. 397 b, Julian dwells more savagely than is his wont on 
having ' taken with his hands and thrust into the pit the barbarians in mind 
and atheists in heart, who had sat at the table of Constantius.' De Broglie, 
IV. 331 n., follows earlier Edd. in rejecting this letter on the strength of this 
sentence, but Teuffel's defence in SGh.ioaidt''s Zeitsch. fiir Gesch., 1845, Vol. rv. 
156 pp., appears quite adequate. Hertlein inserts without comment. 

5 Cf. Jul. Ep. ad Ath. 272 d, Sok. iii. i. 49, Soz. v. v. 8, Philost. iv. 1, 
Zonar. 2111. 12. 



154 JULIAN. 

ment'. Information once invited is hard to curb or control 
perfectly; the guillotine once set in motion ne va pas mal; in 
that active discouragement of Christianity which the Em- 
peror approved, his agents probably transgressed the strict 
observance of justice which he enjoined in the same breath ; 
but it is fair to say that the Commission if not happily 
selected^, was honestly required, honourably intended, and 
removed only too punctiliously from the immediate sphere 
and influence of court, that there might be no suspicion^ of 
Julian's personal sentiments unfairly prejudicing his enemies. 
Years before attaining to the supreme power he had laid it 
down as a theory of government^, that the wise prince, while 
taking strict j)ersonal cognisance of minor ' remediable ' 
crimes, ought rigorously to abstain from sitting in judgment 
on capital offences. These should be tried by proved impar- 
tial judges, whose verdict could neither be warped by preju- 
dice, nor impaired by unjudicial haste. In this edict then 
he carried out in practice a principle which had approved 
itself to his calm judgment, and may be acquitted without 
reserve from the odium of wilful persecution. 
Palace Justice satisfied, or at least a way to its satisfaction duly 

ment. ' prepared, Julian devoted himself to reform. His charity be- 
gan at home. The severest retrenchments were enforced in the 
palace expenditure*^. On his accession Julian found in occu- 
pation a thousand cooks and barbers, butlers and serving-men 
innumerable, and eunuchs ' thicker , than summer flies^' At 
a blow he dismissed them all, and turned the palace into a 

1 Amm. M. xsii. 3. Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 64, p. 106. 

2 The -writer iu Hilg.'s Zeitsckr. fur wiss. Theologie, 1861, notices (p. 409) 
tlie undue predominance of the mihtary element in the Commission. Gib- 
bon shows how unimpeachable was Salustius, how self-satisfied Mamertinus, 
and how violent the remaining four. 

8 This was the object of their holding their sittings across the water at 
Chalcedon. Cf. Jul. EiJ. 23. 

4 Or. II. 89 c D. The monarch, he adds, should be like the queen bee 
who carries no sting. 

5 Amm. M. xxii. 4, Sok. in. 1, Zonar. xiii. 12, Mamert. 11, Liban. Epit. 
p. 565. Schlosser, Uebers. dcr Gesch. in. ii. 342 (cf. also iii. 15 pp.), condemns 
this pohcy, and so too Eobertson, Hist. Christ. Church, Bk. ii. c. iii. p. 341. 

6 Liban. Epit. p. 565. 



ADMINISTEATION. 155 

desert. For the cooks, he wanted, he said, but simple fare, * 
and the preparers of it to dress Hke cooks, not senators : for 
barbers, one was enough for many (which was all the more 
true, no doubt, in days when the Emperor wore the philoso- 
pher's beard, and the courtiers followed suit): for eunuchs, he 
wanted not one, for his first wife was dead, and he had no 
mind to marry a second \ So a general cataclysm swept 
away the whole army of domestics, retainers, official detec- 
tives and spies (the so-called Curiosi), and other parasites 
who had previously clung about the person of the monarch. 
That the bulk of the servants of Constantius were Christians 
is no mere conjecture^. Doubtless that royal barber who^ 
waited on Julian so daintily apparelled, and in addition to 
his handsome salary and perquisites received daily rations 
for twenty squires and as many horses, was a pronounced 
Christian. Whether this be so or no, the abuse was flagrant, 
the reformation just, and no blame attaches to the reformer 
if Christians were the principal sufferers. The sole ground 
for complaint is that their places were refilled in great mea- 
sure by that ' conflux of so-called philosophers,' for which Sophists, 
Sokrates* denounces the Emperor. Sophists, litterati, quacks 
and soothsayers, they came pricking in hungry swarms from 
three continents, thirsting for a share of the spoiP. Each 
had his special claim on the new monarch, his special suf- 
ferings for the good cause to recount, or his special quali- 
fications for useful work in the future. The philosophic 
maxims of their obscurity were forgotten or abjured with a 
marvellous readiness. Ascetics turned Sybarites, and Neo- 
Platonists Epicureans. Maximus himself, dropping the Cynic's 
cloak and stick®, appeared attired in silk and gold ; was at- 
tended by his train of slaves ; feasted luxuriously ; received 
sumptuously, and in all respects affected Asiatic pomp. Nor 

1 Zonar. xiii. 12, Sok. in. i. 50, cf. Misop. 349 c. 

2 Cf. Greg. Naz. Or. iv. p. 586. 

3 Amm. M. xxii. iv. 9. 

4 Sok. III. xiii. 11. 

5 Toiis iravraxv Vy^" V <Pvf^V Ppvd^ovras iirl rk ^aaiXeia, Sok. III. i. 56, 
cf. Jul. Or. VII. 224. 

6 Ep. 37. 414 D. 



156 JULIAN. 

' were imitators slow to follow where the master led. Others, 
by a more refined tiattery, adopted the coarse dress and the 
223^'' ^' ^^^^SSy beard of the Cynic, but at that point ceased to be the 
followers of Diogenes. They neither bridled the appetites, 
nor kept under the sensual passions, nor subdued covetous- 
ness and self-seeking. Their exterior was Cynic, but their 
heart Cyrenaic. Julian's worst foes were of his own house- 
1 hold. Personally he did what he could : by word and look 
1 and act he protested. He wrote an indignant tirade^ against 
* false Cynics ; his dress and appearance grew more and more 
severe ; above all he strove by example of active self-denial 
to shame these courtier-philosophers into worthier ways^ 
His diet became more spare ; his devotion to business more 
unremitting ; his reforms and edicts more rigorous. No man 
could say that he spared himselP. 'Always abstemious, and 
never oppressed by food, he applied himself to business with 
the activity of a bird, and despatched it with infinite ease*,' 
He would write, dictate, and give audience at the same time^. 
His ministers came to him by relays ; as soon as one retired 
to rest or sleep, another was admitted, and then the next, till 
perhaps the circle began again. When the rest of the palace 
was wrapped in sleep the Emperor® sat alone in his library 
despatching correspondence, composing orations, framing de- 
crees, or composing elaborate philosophic lucubrations. Yet 
in the grey of morning he might be found receiving compli- 
mentary calls, hearing petitions, or giving audience to his 
consuls ^ ' He multiplied time by subtracting from leisure ^' 

^ Orat. 6 Eij roiis airaideirovs Kvms belongs to the spring of 362: cf, 
181a. 

* On his fastidious self-restraint of a physical kind Zonar. xiii. xiii. 
p. 1156 has this curious notice ; ^v irepl rrjv dlairav iyKparrjS uio-re Kal tA 
4)V<n,Kct, ravra {avra ?) dLa<l)vyydv€ii', us fxaXiara epvyds Kai rds eKKplaeis rds 
Sia CTTOfxaros. 

^ ' Nihil somno, nihil epulis, nihil otio tribuit; ipsa se naturalium neces- 
sariarumque rerum usurpatioue defraudat, totus commodis publicis vacat.' 
Mamert. 14, and cf. 12, with which cf. Amm. M. sxv. iv. 4, and Ms. 338 c, 
340 b. 

•* Duncombe's version, i. p. 232 note. Cf. Liban. Epit. p. 580. 

« Liban. Epit. p. 680. '^ Sok. iii. i. 54. 

? Mamert. 28. 8 Ibid. 14. 



ADMINISTKATION. 157 

The few hours that he doled out to sleep, were passed often mis. uo b 
upon the hard ground \ Under such circumstances censure 
will be lenient if the prince was able to bridle only, not 
eradicate the rapacity of his followers. Numbers of these 
impostors, on an enemy's testimony^, went disappointed 
away, cursing their own folly, and the deceit, as they were 
pleased to call it, of the Emperor, in not following up his 
invitation with more substantial rewards. While recognising 
his liberality, impartial historians' add that towards un- 
worthy recipients he was less indulgent in favours than his 
position was supposed to demand. 

But Julian's projects of retrenchment were not limited to Financial 
the palace of Constantinople: nor again to mere sumptuary ^J^^'"^' 
laws*, feeble attempts to cure only and not prevent. They 
took a much wider sweep. His legislation testifies to un- 
ceasing activity in this department. His Gallic administra- 
tion had yielded him varied large experience; if in his first 
years he spent 'summer in the camp, winter in the tribunal,' 
during his last year in that country financial and judicial 
reform had engrossed his whole attention. In nothing had . 
he been more successful than in reducing the burdens^ of the / 
overtaxed provincials, and reinvigorating industrial enterprise : [ 
during his brief sojourn at or near Sirmium he had engaged 
in the same good work for the Illyrian and Dalmatian dis- 
tricts'': from Hadria to Nikopolis his life-giving hand had 
touched decaying industries. Now sole Emperor he extended 
like efforts^ through the realm. The two great principles 
that guided his legislation were the withdrawal of immuni- 
ties from favoured classes or individuals, and the prevention 
of corrupt exactions or returns by the official collectors of Collection 

of taxes. 

1 Amm. M. xvi. v. 5, xxv. iv. 5, Liban. E2)it. p. 613, In lul. Hyp. 400 sq. 
^ Greg. Naz. Or. v. xx. p. 689. 

3 Eutrop. X. 16. Schlosser, Uebers. der Gesch. iii. ii., 'rightly notices that 
none but Maximus and Priscus ranked among his councillors. 
* Such as Cod. Just. viii. x. 7. 

5 Mamert. 4, 8. 

6 Amm. M. xvi. v. 14, xxv. iv. 15. ^ Mamert. 9. 

8 So at Antioch, of. Misop. 365 b, 367 a d, Zos. hi. 11, and Thrace, of. 
Ep.Al. 



158 JULIAN. 

taxes. To this last end his earliest and his latest edict' are 
alike directed, and others reinforce them in the interval. 
The principal provisions are for the transmission of exact and 
speedy returns'^ to the provincial governors, who in turn for- 
vs^arded the reports to the emperor: unpunctuality is made 
punishable by a considerable fine. Falsification of the returns 
by the official collectors {rationales) is visited with bodily 
pains and penalties': and without the imperial leave no 
new impost may be introduced, nor existing one modified*. 
Further, a quinquennial tenure of office is prescribed, 
after which is intercalated a non-official year, to the express 
end that complainants may appeal unawed by the terror 
of official persecution and revenge^. Other regulations are 
directed against official bribery and corruption*, and against 
abuses of judicial procedure in the case of public func- 
tionaries I While adopting these precautions against 
official extortion, Julian displayed still greater energy in 
the direct relief of the provincials, chiefly by rigid limita- 
tion of diverse forms of immunities. Coustantius, following 
but exaggerating his father's method, had accorded exemp- 
tions on the largest scale to the Christian clergy. Not only 
monks, not only religious communities of virgins and widows, 
not only the higher clergy, but even the lower orders in the 
Church were wholly or in great part exempted from the ordi- 
nary burdens of the subject. Indeed, if the letter of Julian's 
decree may be pressed, the conclusion would be that the bare 
profession of Christianity in some cases bestowed pecuniary- 
advantages. Not seldom too, besides special endowments of 
churches and the like, the clergy received fixed allowauces of 
the public corn without payment. The system was unmis- 
takeably pernicious. It crippled the State and burdened 

^ Theod. Cod. viii. i. 6, issued at Constantinople in Jan. 362. Theod. 

Cod. XI. XXX. 31, issued Mar. 13, 363, a week after Julian's departure from 
Antioch on his expedition against Persia. 

2 Theod. Cod. xi. xxx. 31, i. xv. 4. 

3 Theod. Cod. vin. i. 6, cf. Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 75, p. 113. 

4 Theod. Cod. XI. xvi. 10. 

5 Theod. Cod. viii. i. 6, 7, 8. 

6 Theod. Cod. n. xxix. 1. ^ Theod. Cod. ix. ii. 1. 



1 



ADMINISTRATION. 159 

industry; it pauperised and not less corrupted the Church by- 
making Christianity a form of money investment. Julian at 
a stroke did away with this large class of immunities. He 
decreed, not indeed of any conscious kindness to the Church, 
that all decurions who as Christians claimed exemption from 
public burdens, should be restored to the tax-roll \ Though 
a few more vehement advocates decried the enactment as 
persecuting, its substantial justice is tacitly admitted by 
soberer ecclesiastical writers. No other edict preserved in 
the Theodosian Code mentions the Christians by name; 
obviously these need no defence, as they merit no reproach. 
When Julian went beyond this^, and conferred immunities 
and allowances of corn on Pagan priests, he swerved from 
strict justice and sound economy, though merely adopting, be 
it remembered, the practice of all his predecessors. In the 
one case where details are furnished the corn and wine dues 
are not granted to the priests for their own support,- but for 
distribution among the sick and needy, the alleged motive 
being that Jews and Christians may not have all the good 
almsgiving to themselves. Nor was it Christians alone whom 
he robbed of their exemptions. Their due share of taxes is 
exacted from all hereditary holders of estates^ and from all 
landowners, all private arrangements between vendors and 
lessees and tax-collectors being strictly prohibited^ On the 
other hand certain exemptions are accorded. One edict of 
the kind guaranteeing large vested immunities to privileged 
persons^ appears wide in scope. Another secures the cus- 

1 Theod. Cod. xii. i. 50, xni. i. 4, and Jul. Ep. 11 : cf. Soz. v. v. 2, 
Philost. VII. 4, Nikeph. x. 5. 

^ Soz. V. iii. 2 makes the charge, which Cassiod. vi. 4 transcribes and 
Nikeph. x. iv. 13 rehearses. So too Philost. vii. 4. Ep. 49. 430 c grants 
30,000 modii of corn and 60,000 pints (^^orat) of wine yearly to Arsakius high- 
priest of Galatia. 

^ Theod. Cod. xi. xix. 2. So in particular at Antioch : Misop. 367 d. 

* Theod. God. xi. iii. 3, xi. iii. 4. 

^ It extends to all without exception, quicumque capitationis indulgentiam 
immunitatemque meruerimt. Theod. Cod. xi. xii. 2. I do not know how 
large a class the provision included, or by what extraordinary services the 
privilege had been acquired. The ensuing sentences teach us the require- 
ments of Julian. 



IGO JULIAN. 

tomary privileges of physicians of the highest grade'. New 
exemptions are accorded only to limited classes and in 
acknowledgment of special services to the state. Military 
service would seem to take precedence. Three years of mili- 
tary service exonerate all agentes in j^ci^cUio from subsequent 
curial functions'^ while ten years suffice to do the same for 
all of curial descent". There are but two other exempting 
enactments preserved in the Theodosian Code. The first is 
characteristic and runs thus: "First of all things comes war; 
second, letters the adornment of peace. Therefore on all 
engaged in the service of our scrinia, we bestow the second 
place in privilege: all who have served for 1.5 years in the 
office of records and in the due custody of despatches and 
charters shall be, every liability notwithstanding, excused 
from curial obligations*." The one remaining immunity 
granted is very complete; for it absolves even from assess- 
ment as a decurion; its attainment in the fourth century must 
have been indeed exceptional, and perhaps not ill-deserved; 
it was the guerdon reserved for fathers of thirteen children^! 

In his imperial progresses Julian was used to confer privi- 
leges on special towns. But these took most generally the 
form of increased municipal privileges — for Julian did his 
utmost to foster a healthy spirit of independence and self- 
government*' — or of special rights or freedoms for the promo- 
tion of trade or the encouragement of religion. No instance 
is reported of the remission of the ordinary taxes. Church 

^ Theod. Cod. xiii. iii. 4, and Jul. Ej). 25 b, -whicla does not limit the 
exemption from curial services to apxt-o-rpoL alone. 

2 Theod. Cod. vi. xxvii. 2. An additional clause, the motive of which is 
unexplained, bestows the same privilege on the agentes gaining their dis- 
charge from the services during Julian's fourth consulship, sc. 363 a d. 

^ Theod. Cod. xii. i. 56, by an obvious error assigned to 363 instead 
of 362. 

^ Theod. Cod. vi. xxvi. 1. There were four departments of the Sacra 
Scrinia or Eecord Office — memoriae, epistolanun, libellorum, epistolarum 
Graecarum. 

5 Theod. Cod. xii. i. 55. 

6 Cf. Mamert. 24, Misop. 365 a with many indications in the same piece 
of liberties vested in the Curia of Antioch : also his reconstruction of the 
Senate of Constantinople, and other benefits conferred on the town : Zos. 
III. 11, Himer. Or. 7. See further Gibbon, ch. xxii. 



I 



ADMINISTRATION. 161 

writers' complain, and not improbably with some truth, of 
partiality displayed towards Pagan cities, but as specific 
instances^ are not alleged, and the murmurs are withal rare, 
this can hardly have been very aggravated, and would pro- 
bably, could the truth be discovered, resolve itself into indirect 
favours conferred on cities possessed of famous sanctuaries". 
That he did not confine his favours to Pagan cities is certain 
from his treatment of Constantinople and Antioch. By origin 
and tradition Constantinople was Christian to the backbone. 
At Julian's accession alone among great cities it had not even 
one temple : yet he showered benefits upon it. Than Antioch 
there was no more 'protestant' city in the Empire, nor any 
more defiant against Julian personally. Yet he by no means 
withheld from it wise favours, and was able to make there 
large abatements of taxation*. It is observable that while 
Julian thus carefully restricted immunities, and exacted their 
due quota impartially from all holders of property, and while 
he constantly bore in mind the needs and welfare of his 
poorer subjects, he did not rush into the opposite extreme of 
grinding down the wealthy. In the absence of much indirect 
taxation there was a dangerous tendency to- this in Imperial 
finance. No class in the state were so heavily taxed in 
proportion to their means as tbe curiales: accordingly Julian 
while fining severely all evasion of their duties was careful in 
the same edict to protect them from undue exactions ^ In the 
same way he declined to levy either from senators or others 
forced contributions to the so-called 'Crown Gold,' declaring 
it by edict voluntary in fact and not in pretence alone. 

If it was to general principles, to annulling exemptions Public 
and enforcing honest punctual collection of the taxes that ^^^^ ' 
Julian devoted his fullest energies, he did not neglect surveil- 
lance over minor matters and removed at least one b^irden- 
some abuse with a very firm hand. Throughout the empire 

^ Soz. V. iii. ^, with Nikeph. x. 4. 

^ Cf. however, Julian's award between Maiuma and Gaza., inf. p. 185, and 
his answer to Pessinus (see p, 112) in Ep. 49. 431 d. 
3 Cf. Lib. Epit. p. 565. 
* Zos. m. 11, Misop. 365 b, 367 ad. 
« Theod. Cod. xii. i. 50, cf. xiii. i. 4. 

R. E. 11 



162 JULIAN. 

one of the normal demands made upon the subject was the 
repair of roads and the provision of horses for the public 
service of the district. Rising from small beginnings, the 
charge had reached formidable dimensions: it had become 
the fashion for not merely the highest functionaries, but for 
all provincial magnates or petty officers of state to travel 
hither and thither at the public expense. Not content with 
the modest one-horse vehicle, they required their two and 
their three horses as the case might be, or perhaps a train of 
carriages to transport their wives, children and baggage to 
boot. To such a pass had things come, that even the trans- 
port of bulky wares, the conveyance of blocks of marble for 
the enrichment of private edifices, and suchlike gratifications 
of luxury were charged upon the suffering provincials\ The 
system had become a crying scandal: the poor were sinking 
under the burdens it involved: the whole administration of 
the public post threatened to break down under its own 
weight. More than one vigorous decree^ copes with this evil. 
The privilege is restricted to certain defined officials; none 
but the governor is permitted to use it at discretion: on all 
others very definite limitations are imposed both as to the 
character of the vehicle and the frequency of use: no exten- 
sion of these is allowed except under the Imperial hand. 
Bishops, it appears, had under the regime of Constantius 
been among the most hardened offenders. Ammian^ singles 
them out as the chief culprits, and if so they would be among 
the sufferers, or rather the losers by Julian's decree. But so far 
as the edict itself particularises, it is 'the inordinate require- 
ments and restless peregrinations' of 'prefects, magistrates and 
consulars' that are assailed: nothing but prejudice can ex- 
pound this legislation by religious sympathies or antipathies. 
Financial On the whole, though Julian — as his Antioch Corn Laws 
tion. testify — was not infallible enough to escape every economical 

error, it cannot be gainsaid, what even his vilifiers* admit, that 

1 Theod. Cod. viii. v. 15. 

2 Theod. Cod. viii. v. 12, 13, 14. Cf. Sok. iii. 1. 

3 Amm. M. xxi. xvi. 18. 

^ (j)opG)v &v€<ns and k\owQv iiriTifirjais are both accorded to him by Greg. 
Naz. Or. iv. c. 75, p. 113. 



ADMINISTRATION. 1G3 

lie relieved the overtaxed provincial, that he cheeked official 
avarice, that he diminished pauperism, and gave honest 
industry its rightful due, in fact, that to the extent of his 
powers and knowledge he laboured, without fear and without 
favour, to protect without pampering the poor, to toll without 
plundering the rich, to economise yet not stint imperial ex- 
penditure \ 

Over Julian's judicial legislation, apart from the already Judiciary 
recorded Chalcedon Commission, there is no call to linger. '^"''^" 
It aims at improving the procedure of courts^ at preventing 
partialities^, at mitigating the position of debtors*, at protect- 
ing minors and amending the marriage laws, but can nowhere 
be twisted to a suspicion of religious partisanship, unless 
indeed the abolition of the irregular Church jurisdiction^ that 
had already sprung up for the settlement of wills, the appro- Ep. 52. 437 a 
priation of property, and the arbitration of suits, by episcopal 
courts can be included in that category. 

With regard to administration the case stands differently. Governors. 
Statements diverge concerning Julian's choice of his subordi- 
nates. Rufinus^ declares that Julian debarred Christians 
from becoming governors of provinces, on the ground that 
their law forbade them to inflict capital punishment; others 
dilate on the rapacity, arrogance and inhumanity of his 
prefects and officers. It is true that in parting spite he 
inflicted a rough governor on the recalcitrant Antiochenes. 
But the fellow seems to have frightened his troublesome 
vassals into order without any great enormities ^ On the 
other hand even Gregory of Nazianzus^ though maligning 
Julian's creatures, and averring that apostasy was the royal 
road to office, seems elsewhere to admit some sort of justifi- 

1 Eutrop. X. 16, in provinciales iustissimus : et tributornm, quatemif3 
fieri posset, repressor, eivilis in cunctos : mediocrem habeus aerarii curam. 

2 Theod. Cod. i. xvi. 8 ; 11. v. 1, xii. 1 ; v. xii. 1 ; xi. xxx. 29, 30 ; xv. i. 
8,9. 

^ Theod. Cod. ix. ii. 1. "* Theod. Cod. xi. xxviii. 1. 

5 Theod. Cod. in. i. 3, xiii. 2. 

6 Euf. I. 32, and so Sok. in. xiii. 2, Soz. v. 18, Nikeph. x. 24. 
' Amm. M. xxiii. ii. 3. with which cf. Liban. Epist. 722. 

8 Or. IV. 75, p. 113. 

11—2 



164! JULIAN. 

cation for the pridu Julian took in his selection of agents, 
and Mamertinus* avers that in selecting governors he looked 
not to intimacy of friendship, but to blamelessness of cha- 
racter. The most natural conclusion is that, as might prima 
facie be expected, Julian's appointments were for the most 
part or perhaps altogether confined to Pagans, but that in 
making his choice he used all possible discrimination'^ In 

cf. Or. 2. 91. theory, if not in act, he certainly laid much stress on the 
duty of careful selection of his ministers by the monarch. 
What diligence he displayed in providing against preventible 
abuses of power has been already shown. This very diligence 
exposed him to misrepresentations: he enacted a salutary 
decree^ that any one of whatsoever rank or order who had 
attained to public functions of any kind whatsoever by irre- 
gular or underhand methods should forthwith forfeit all 
emolument therefrom derived. As a matter of course the 
officials, who were nominated by Coustantius, were by pro- 
fession Christians to a man. And Christian writers were too 
apt to regard as martyrs for their faith men whose degrada- 
tion was really due to far less honourable causes. Artemius* 
secured a decent or even honourable niche in ecclesiastical 
records; even Bp. George himself was supposed to have been 
transfigured into the titular saint and patron of English 
chivalry. 

Funerals, There is in the Theodosian Code one Statute which may. 
fairly be traced to religious differences. It is a sort of police 
regulation against trespass and desecration of grave plots^ 

,/ Mamert. 25. Cf. Amm. M. xxii. vii. 6, 7. 

2 It is just to say that Amm. M. xxi. x. 8, gives a very poor character to 
Nevitta, one of Julian's most favoured nominees. Cf. Or. n. 87 c. 

3 The decree is worth quoting in full, for its decision and thoroughness. 
Quicumque cuiuslibet ordinis, dignitatis, aliquod opus publicum, quoquo 
genere, obscura interpretatione meruerit, fructu talis beneficii sine aliqua 
dubitatione privetur. Non solum enim revocamus, quod factum est, verum 
etiam in futurum eavemus, ne qua fraude tentetur. Theod. Cod. xv. i. 10. 

^ Artemius, infr. p. 184. About George, Gibbon there can be no doubt 
blundered : the saint's pedigree is better traced in Baring Gould's Curious 
Myths of the Middle Ages. 

^ Rifling of graves became at this time a common practice. Muratori 
{Anecdota Graeca) collected eighty short copies of verses by Greg. Naz. 
against the violators of tombs. Cf. De Bleterie on this decree. 



ttc. 



ADMINISTRATION. 165 

accompanied by a clause prohibiting funerals by day, as 
inauspicious and unpleasant to the living, without any gain 
to the dead. Though the philosophy of the decree is ex- 
plained and justified in a lengthy rescript^ quite in Julian's 
own manner, in which he expounds the natural affinities 
between Darkness and the Grave, Sleep and Death, and the 
probable diversities between the Gods Celestial and the Gods 
Infernal, with some enlargement on the dissonance of funerals 
with the market, the law-court, the daily round of town life, 
and above all the worship of the Gods, the date of the decree, 
Feb. 12, and the place, Antioch, irresistibly compel us to 
connect it with the famous removal of the bones of Babylas, 
and the impulse thereby given to converting public funerals 
into Christian demonstrations. So viewed the decree re- 
mains legitimate enough, rather a wise safeguard against 
irritating disorders than in any sense persecution. 

Julian's legislation on property touched the Church on Bestora- 
one of its tenderest sides. The age of endowments, of mag- *^^^^ ^^, 

=> . . propei'tp. 

nificent buildings, of landed estates and propertied communi- 
ties had commenced. The fervour of acquisition, which late 
emperors had so fostered, received from Julian a rude slap. 
He decreed^ in general terms that municipal property which 
during late troubles had passed into private hands should be 
restored to the townships, to be leased out at a just valuation. 
Equitable as was the spirit of the decree, its practical execu- 
tion involved many hardships and aroused fierce resentment. 
Much of the property in question, probably by far the greater 
portion, had passed into the hands of Christians, not seldom 
for directly religious purposes ^ During the later years of Con- 
stantius, when fortune had sunned him into a full-blown 
tyrant, capricious, arrogant and intolerant. Pagans had every- 
where felt the weight of the displeasure of their most Christian 
king. Never perhaps was monarch served by more unscru- 
pulous ministers: his organised system of espionage drove 

1 E}}- 77 in Hertlein, disinterred by him from a MS. [366] in S. Mark's 
library, Venice, and first edited in Hermes, Vol. viii. pp. 167 — 172. 

2 Theod. Cod. x. iii. 1. 

3 Liban. Ejiit. p. 564, Soz. v. 5. _ 



ion JULIAN. 

every true man from his court aud his service: if such a one 
held to his post, he soon became, like Silvanus, the victim of 
the plots of the wretched underlings whose interests he 
thwarted. Men of the Eusebian stamp were everywhere busy 
at their work of spoliation and embezzlement. Independ- 
ently of these private depredations, an almost official pillage ^ 
of temples was carried on. Some were rifled, some closed, 
some completely demolished ^ Now the edict decreed the 
restoration of all these. It was enforced upon Christian 
Bishops, like Eleusius of Kyzikus, no less than upon unprin- 
cipled speculators. Injustice once committed, nothing is 
harder than to repair it. Reparation too often involves 
injustice hardly less grievous than that which it attempts to 
cure. Of this the present edict is an instance. That the 
original owners should receive compensation Avas fair and 
reasonable : that the existing owners should give the com- 
pensation by no means followed. In many cases the property 
in "question had been put up to open sale, and the title of the 
owner was perfectly legitimate. The real defaulter had long 
ago disappeared, or wasted the proceeds, or perhaps met his 
proper doom. A case in point is that of Theodulus, a Chris- 
tian gentleman of Antioch. He had the misfortune to buy 
(at its full price) a plot of ground fraudulently come by: he 
had beautified it by a palatial residence, which formed a new 
ornament to the town. The site had now to be restored to 
the city authorities, and all that was upon it mercilessly 
confiscated or destroyed. Another Christian, Basiliskus by 
name, who in their darker days had befriended Pagan fellow- 
tOAvnsmen, found himself on similar grounds called upon for 
an enormous compensation; nothing but the leniency of his 
creditors stood between him and absolute penury. These 
are instances furnished by Pagan evidence: they serve to 

^ The closing of temples is actually decreed in a law (Just. Cod, i. 
xi. 1) supposed to date from 353. But the absence of date as well as a 
(perhaps clerical) mistake in the Consular names appended, casts some doubt 
on the actual publication of the edict. 

" For the systematic spohatiou and demolition of temples by the state 
authorities, cf. Liban. Pro Tempi, pp. 163, 185, &c. and Epp. 607, 673, 1080. 
Christian writers, e.g. Soz. iii. 17, quite bear out the statement.';. 



ADMINISTEATION. 167 

show the incompleteness of a decree in its main tenor per- 
fectly equitable. 

There is one class of cases, in which the complications 
were greater still. There was no commoner destination of 
the sites, materials or embellishments of heathen temples 
than their conversion to the use of Christian sanctuaries. 
Often enough the h,olders had no real vested right of owner- 
ship: some unprincipled patron had perhaps handed over to 
the church, by way of atonement for his sins, a rich site or a 
handsome edifice torn from the rightful proprietors. One 
ordinary sample will illustrate the action of the edict. At 
Tarsus, on his way to the Persian war, Artemius, priest of the 
temple of .^sculapius at ^gse, represented to Julian that 
the chief Christian minister of the place had taken away the 
temple columns and employed them in rearing a Christian 
Church. The emperor forthwith ordered restoration of the 
stolen property at the expense of the bishop \ In this and 
analogous cases a real grievance, not the less real because it may 
be dubbed sentimental, was involved. However faulty the 
title, the place had now become holy, set apart by episcopal 
benediction, sanctified by the feet of worshippers, consecrated 
maybe by the tombs of martyrs. The rare marble that held 
the holy water or formed the altar slab had been torn per- 
chance from Pagan shrines, yet had not the sacramental 
water rested there and the holy elements reposed upon it ? 
The gold of the chalices and the jewels that sparkled round 
them had graced the thankoffering to some heathen God, 
yet now had not the blood of Christ made them for ever 
sacred? It is easy to imagine the strength of passions stirred 
by such associations, and the bitterness of disputes into which 
they entered. In some cases a compromise might be effected 
by pecuniary compensation; in others this was impossible; in 
others refused. No better illustration could be found than 
the story of Mark of Arethusa^ He had taken advantage oi Mark of 
Constantius' proclivities to demolish an ancient and much 

^ Zonar. xni. xii. 25. After Julian's death tlie disputed column (one 
only had heen as yet removed) returned to the Christian sanctuary. 
2 Greg. Naz. Or. iv. c. 88, 1'22 pp, Soz. v. 10. Theod. iii. 7. 



168 JULIAN. 

revered temple, and on its site liad reared his metropolitan 
church. The order came that he should restore the site and 
rebuild the shrine; or as an alternative provide the equiva- 
lent sum according to fair valuation. He refused to do either. 
Avoiding the fury of the rabble, at first he fled. The mob 
then turned upon his followers. Hearing of the danger to 
which he had exposed his flock, the ol^ man returned to 
brave their rage. His grey hairs won him no reverence, nor 
his stately bearing. There were magistrates and philosophers 
and ladies there; but none raised a hand in his defence. He 
was stripped naked and dragged through the filth. Wanton 
women jeered him; schoolboys pricked him with their pens, 
or leaped upon him. When abuse and insult had exhausted 
themselves, the holy man, bruised, bleeding, torn, but still 
alive, was smeared with honey and treacle, and hung up as 
the prey of bees and wasps. But his spirit rose at every 
affront; his tone grew higher each moment. Suspended 
there he told them scornfully that he was higher than they. 
He rejected every overture\ Not one penny, he said, could 
a Christian bishop contribute to the cost of a Pagan shrine. 
He would as soon pay the whole as a single penny. Nothing 
could move him, or extort one word of compromise. His 
stubborn patience turned the laugh, says Sozomen, against 
his persecutors; and even among the highest ofiScers of state 
new souls that day were added to the Church. 

This may serve as a sample of the working of this famous 
edict. Though his stedfastness of faith, and his courage 
under torture may condone his fault, clearly Mark was in the 
wrong. The original aggressor he was bound to make full 
reparation. Cases analogous to these and few in number 
hardly merit the name of persecution. Yet during the open- 
ing months at any rate of his reign it is difficult to adduce 
others against Julian. In the enactment of this edict an 
impartial judgment will acquit him of bigotry or wilful per- 
secution. The worst charge that can be brought is that of 
haste and indiscretion, a serious but more venial allegation. 

1 By Gregory's admission tlie Pagans abridged their demands to a charge 
little short of nominal. Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 90. So Theod. iii. vii. 10. 



ADMINISTRATION. 169 

No bare edict could meet the case. A permanent commis- 
sion could alone have examined and adjusted conflicting 
claims, for which Julian's own enactment rightly laid down 
the general rule. In places doubtless acting magistrates 
exceeded their commission, but this must not be laid entirely 
at Julian's door. It was the fear of Julian's displeasure 
which more than anything else restrained the mob of Are- 
thusa from the worst extremities of violence. Mark was the 
bishop who had saved ^ him when a child of six from the 
clutch of the murderers. From respect for Julian's wrath 
even the infuriated mob dared not put him to death: nor 
did the emperor subsequently withdraw his sheltering segis^ 
Thus even this horrible tale becomes a testimony to Julian's 
personal tolerance rather than his violence. 

It is time to pass to Julian's directly religious legislation. Religious 
In that department his policy was, it need hardly be said, ^fj^^ "" 
reactionary. Historians^ impute to him an eagerness to undo 
the work of Constantius. If Constantius had exiled Chris- 
tians, Julian recalled them: clerical immunities which Con- 
stantius had granted Julian rescinded ; his favours are said 
to have been more marked towards the sects or the indi- 
viduals, who had been visited by his predecessor with the 
severest tokens of displeasure. If there is partial truth in the 
charge that Constantius' adoption of one policy was in itself 
a recommendation of the opposite to Julian, he certainly did 
not hamper his action by this petty negative conception. 
His idea of the true relations of Church and State was too Church 
large, too positive, it might almost be said too dogmatic for State. 
such a procedure. He may justly be called the Constantino 
of Paganism. Not merely because in his religious legislation 

1 On this the silence of the historians casts some douht ; Valesius to 
satisfy a chronological difficulty as to the death of the first Mark (cf. note 

on Soz. V. X. 10) assumes a second Mark to have succeeded to the same see. * 

Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 91 identifies the two without misgiving. The orator 
questions whether Mark's sufferings were not a just, though imperfect, 
retribution for his misplaced act of humanity. 

2 Liban. Ep. 730. Theoph.'s romance (i. p. 73) of Mark's entrails being 
torn out is a useful warning. 

3 E.g. Soz. V. 5. 



170 JULIAN. 

he retunifed to the Hncs laid down by the edict of Milan, 
with this difference, that wliile free toleration was accorded 
to all, the weight of State favour and material support was 
transferred from the Christians to the Pagans : but also be- 
cause he did endeavour in some sort to realise a Pa^an 
Church \ to create a mutually helpful union between the State 
and the new Church, at once imparting religious sanctions to 
services undertaken for the state, and conversely conferring 
recoo^nised civic rank on the ministers of religion, in a word 
to establish Paganism. But though i^rima facie the Constan- 
tine of Paganism, he was actuated by a more religious spirit 
than the Christian Constantine, Both hoped to effect a 
spiritual as well as temporal unity in the Roman Empire. 
But with Constantine the union of Church with State was 
attempted primarily in the interests of the latter. Julian 
conceived religious unity to be no less important than poli- 
tical. The achievement of the former was of the two the 
higher task. The priest took precedence of the magistrate ; 
Julian as Pontifex Maximus, Pope Julian as one writer calls 
him, was a more exalted personage than Julian Imperator: 
the suppression of Germany, the overthrow of Persia were 
preliminaries to the reconstruction of Hellenism. This re- 
construction aimed at nothing less than a federation of all 
existing cults into a Pagan Church Catholic, realising its 
intellectual unity in the doctrines of Neo-Platonism, its ad- 
ministrative in the person of the Emperor its head. 

His conception of this Pagan Church will be presently ex- 
amined-: at this point its relation to the body politic alone 
comes under discussion. All persecution of Paganism was 
as a matter of course forbidden : the destruction of Pagan tem- 
ples became a criminal offence, an attack upon the property 
of the State. The official observance of Sunday and Christian 
feasts was at once discontinued. But much more positive 
steps were taken. The world-stage witnessed a veritable 

^ It is odd enough to find Neander's translator [The Emp. Julian, p. 107) 
shrinking from the collocation -vfrhich Neander had coiTectly supplied, and 
devoting a naive note '^ Kirche in the German; but I caunot render it 
Cliurch...T." to au avowal of shyness. 



ADMINISTRATION. 171 

transformation scene. It was one of Julian's first acts to 
ensure the re-opening of the temples^; he did not confine him- 
self to exhortation or example : charges were laid upon the 
Christian destroyers, grants were made from the Imperial 
treasury, in aid of restoration^; worshippers, in the army if 
not elsewhere, were officially remunerated^; immunities were 
granted to priests, or at least privileges conferred upon them. 
The great festivals of heathendom, the Ludi Saeculares for in- 
stance, were reinaugurated with historic pomp. The Emperor, 
as Pontifex Maximus, became in virtue of his office head of the 
Church, Defender of the Faith: he turned the palace into 
a temple : at sunrise and sunset he offered libations^ : he ap- 
pointed priests; established grades and orders; distributed 
provinces into dioceses; visited or deprived unworthy priests; Ep.si 
prescribed rules of Church Discipline ; regulated vestments, 
precedence civil and ecclesiastical, celebration of festivals, 
indeed everything short of doctrine, which was left to national 
or congregational predilections. 

Nor was it within the Church alone, as distinct from Paganism 
State, that he manifested this activity. The Church was to jirmy. 
be a definitely recognised factor in the State, almost another 
aspect of the State itself. Now the first duty of the State, 
almost its raison d'etre, was war®; from a Roman point of view 
that function took undisputed precedence of all arts of peace. 
In so far, the Emperor himself excepted, the army was the 
truest as well as the most tangible representative of the State. 
It was there that Julian made the most consistent efforts 
to revive Paganism, and that his efforts were most rewarded 
with success®. Eeligion with the army had always been in 
the main a matter of discipline; Constantine had made ser- 
vices a part of drill. Re-conversion was easy. Soldiers 
rendered very unquestioning adhesion to the creed of a suc- 

1 Amm. M. xxii. v. 2, Sok. iii. i. 48, xi. 4, Soz. v. 1. Lib. Epit. 
p. 564, ILepi Tin. 'louX. p. 57. In this paragraph I restate in its legal con- 
nexion what has been already treated in its religious aspects. 

" Soz. V. iii. 1. Nikeph. x. 5. ^ Liban. Epit. lxxxi. p. 578. 

■» Liban. Epit. lx. p. 564, Ad lul. Hyp. p. 394. 

6 Cf. Theod. Cod. vi. xxvi. 1, supra, p. 160. 

« Greg. Naz. Or. it. 64, p. 106. 



172 JULIAN. 

cessful and thoroughly popular commander: and a little pious 
adjustment of decorations and promotions would produce a 
most rapid and sensible effect. When Christianity was pub- 
licly adopted as the state religion, such religious requirements 
as army discipline recognised were modified suitably to the 
emergency. Now that Christianity yielded in turn to Pagan- 
ism, the reverse process ensued as a matter of course. The 
religious observance of Sunday was officially ignored. The 
Laharuui^ was in turn supplanted. The genius of Rome 
replaced the figure of the Cross. Statues of the Emperor 
were surrounded with Pagan emblems^; he was represented 
as receiving from Jupiter the purple and the diadem, or 
going to battle with the approving smile of Mars. Christian 
writers, new and old, have combined to interpret this as a 
cunning plot, worthy of the Apostate, to catch men unawares 
and render them unconscious perverts. In reality it was 
nothing of the kind; it was the most obvious and the only 
consistent carrying out of Julian's first principles. Rather, 
it would have been duplicity to do otherwise. Julian did 
not conceal his Paganism : he paraded it. To have played 
the Pagan as an individual, as legislator, and as Pontifex Maxi- 
mus, and then to have flinched from the part as Imperator 
would have been sheer childishness. He claimed the right, 
which in Eoman law and public opinion he indubitably pos- 
sessed, of regulating the religious ceremonial of the State. 
The view that such representations as those just alluded to 
were crafty traps to contrive that men, in doing obeisance to 
their Emperor, should in the act pay homage to the heathen 
Gods, is a clumsy aspersion, far less consonant with the 
character or the political position of Julian. It is on a line 
with that reading of history, which can only explain Julian's 
abstinence from persecution, by assuming that he grudged 
Christians the honour of martyrdom. 
The Dona- There is one occasion^ at least, which has been somewhat 

'""'^ coloured by Gregory's rhetoric, on which state ritual evoked 

Mutiny. J o J 

^ Cf. Riiiuart, Passio Bonosi et Maximiliani, Soz. v. xvii. 2, Greg. Naz. 

Or. IV. c. 66, p. 107. 

= Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 80, 81, pp. 116, 117. Soz. v. 17. 

3 Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 8B, p. 118 pqq., Soz. v. 17, Theod. in. 16, 17. 



ADMINISTRATION. 173 

rebellion. ,/It was usual to celebrate great festivals on tiie 
Empero;p*'s natal day by a donative to the praetorian troops. 
It had been the immemorial custom, in loyal acknowledg- 
ment of the gift, to sprinkle frankincense upon the altar 
prepared in readiness. When Julian's day of distribution 
came, the antique custom was adhered to. The ceremony 
.was made easy even to the scrupulous. No Pagan image 
was there, no Pagan God invoked. There was mere compli- 
ance with a piece of military etiquette. So those that hesi- 
tated were assured, and so the judicious reader may still be 
ready to believe. At the time not a man seems to have de- 
murred. Afterwards, however, when they had returned to 
quarters, as they sat at mess^, significant inuendoes were flung 
out, whether by the zeal of indiscreet Pagans or tlie malice of 
renegade Christians. Over the cups words ran high: con- 
sternation and uproar ensued. Some of the more vehement 
Christians, carried away by excitement, rushed to the palace, 
loudly proclaiming their loyalty to Christ. It was an act of 
mutiny; and Julian was too wise and strict a disciplinarian 
to allow such military insubordination to pass unnoticed. 
Christianity was the last pretext that he was likely to accept 
as an excuse for license. He ordered the ringleaders to be 
flogged. But this sentence, in deference we are given to 
understand to popula,r feeling, he subsequently commuted for 
exchange to a less favoured military post I 

An analogous policy was pursued in the empire at large — Coinage. 
Pagan emblems were re-adopted in the Imperial mint; in the 

1 Johnson, Ansioer to Jovian, p. 202, shrewdly observes, ' This terrible 
Legion... consists of a dozen or fourteen Men at the most, for they all rose 
up frona one Table.' The ' Theban Legion ' became a byword in these 
seventeenth century controversies on Passive Obedience. 

2 Theodoret embelhshes his account with more romantic details. By his 
reading the offenders were led out to execution. The' eldest generously 
besought the executioner to begin with the youngest, for fear the d«ath 
of his elder comrades might sap his courage. The sword was bared, the 
youngest of the number, Eomanus by name, was kneehng to the blow, when 
the reprieve came. ' So Eomanus then,' said the intrepid youth, ' is not 
worthy to be called Christ's martyr.' Theod. in. 17. Eode, p. 63, points out 
with perfect justice that the whole proceeding affected only the praetorian 
troops, and not the army at large. 



174 JULIAN. 

strictly Roman coinage impersonations of the Glory, tlie 
Valour, or tlie Safety of Rome predominate; but on the Alex- 
andrian the commonest of impressions is the Serapis head, 
with some personification of Nilus, Anubis, or Isis, on the re- 
verse; the latter very variously figured, sometimes crowned 
with the lotus or holding the sistrum, noAv standing on her 
galley, or drawn in her hippopotamus car, or once again mount- 
ed on wolf or dog, or suckling the infant Horus. On the few 
surviving specimens of Antiochene coinage occurs more than 
once the veiled. Genius of Autiocli with her turreted crown 
and at her feet a river God, while Apollo is portrayed on 
the reverse. Even more distinctively Pagan than these is 
the die representing the sacrificial bulP with twin stars 
above the victim's head. Strangely enough no single coin 
with the impress of a heathen God bears Julian's name^ 
Public Public buildings received a similar treatment. The great 

edifices, public fountain at Antioch for instance was dedicated to 

d'C. 

heathen Gods. Theodoret' scents a plot to incriminate Chris- 
tians in the guilt of eating meats or drinking from vessels 
that had been Sprinkled with the lustral water of a heathen 
deity. A less unfavourable construction is more in accord- 
ance with the facts. Julian did but reassert the right assumed 
by Constantino, the right namely of the Emperor to share 
that religious liberty which was the privilege of his subjects. 
But the Emperor was in many respects the individual repre- 
sentativ-e of the State. He was so in religion as in other 
things. The State religion was in other terms the religion 
of the Emperor, not the religion of the majority, or of any 
representative body. With a change in the Emperor's 

1 On this cf. Sok. in. 17, Soz. v. 19, Mis. 355 d, and notes on 3Iis. 360 d 
in Buncombe's translation (p. 278). I have figured this interesting histori- 
cal coin as frontispiece. The two stars are unexplained ; as symbols of the 
Dioskmi they woifld here seem u-relevant ; Mr King suggests to me that they 
may have reference to the notion (still prevalent in the East) of the -world 
resting on a bull's horns, and being tossed at times from one to the other. 
The specimen engraved is in Trinity College Library, Cambridge, and in 
i-espect of the full legend HEKACLA seems unique. 

^ He and his wife are more than once represented as Serapis and Isis. 

^ Theod. III. 15, repeated in the Acta of luventinus and Maximinus. 
{Kuinaxt, p. 523.) 



ADMINISTRATION. 175 

religion came necessarily a change in the State ceremonial, 
wherever religion came into play. It was a matter of course 
that at Julian's accession the State religious ceremonial 
should change. He had as perfect a right to restore Pagan 
ensigns as had Constantine to introduce the Labarum. It 
was no more mean of Julian to set Jupiter over the head of 
his statues than of Constantine to be portrayed with the 
Cross. It was as natural for him to dedicate public buildings 
to heathen Gods as for Constantine to dedicate them to 
martyrs. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

PERSECUTION UNDER JULIAN. 

6'croi t' eyivovTO SiUKTai 
wpdcrdev Kal /j-eTiireiTa Kal vcrTarioiai xP^^oLai, 
wv irvnaTov irjiwrbv re, KaKov BeXt'ao fiepeOpou, 
Seivbv 'lovKiavoLO Kparos^ xpvx^^P dXerrjpos. 

Greg. Naz. 

■rnldew p.kv iirix^ipuv ^Loi'feadai di ovk d^iwf a0r6s ovSiv 
64>eKos evpicTKe rijs dvdyKtjs. LiBANius. 



Division 
of reign 
into 
periods. 



Section I. 

Acts of Persecution. 

The quotations that head this chapter show that no shght 
discrepancies must be faced in considering the question 
whether and how far Julian deserves the title of persecutor. 
The Christian historians appear, if but roughly, to recognise 
two distinct periods in Julian's reign, or at least a change of 
policy, which though it cannot be assigned definitely to a 
very precise time or place, yet stamped the beginning and 
close of his reign with distinguishable characters. At the 
outset of his o-eign, writes Sokrates\ 'the emperor Julian was 
indulgent to all alike, but as time went on he began to display 
partialities.' And Theodoret^ is hardly less explicit. True 
the materials have been so ill labelled and sorted, that only 
approximate correctness can be attained": but something 

1 Sok. in. 11. 2 Theod. m. 15. 

^ Sozomen, after rehearsing the main instances of martyrdom which had 
«ome to his knowledge, says candidly, v. xi. 'For the sake of clearness 
I have recounted all together, even where the various occasions differed from 
each other.' 



PERSECUTION. 177 

will be gained iu precision if we refer to tlie period of the 
residence at Antioch such incidents as demonstrably fall 
within it, grouping the rest together even at the risk of 
sometimes unduly anticipating. Further, in considering Clasni/cu- 
charges of persecution during the earlier part of Julian's ^a^^g; 
reign, it will be well to discriminate various classes into which 
the alleged instances naturally fall. First, instances of local 
outbreaks of popular violence^: secondly, official acts of perse- 
cution by local governors : thirdly, cases in which the emperor 
Avas directly implicated. Under our first head might fall the 1. Local 
sufferings of Mark of Arethusa, which have already been "" '^^^ '*' 
recited. A more notorious instance is the fate of the virgins 
of Heliopolis^ In this town had flourished a famous temple HeUopo- 
of Venus, in connexion with which the inhabitants used to " 
drive a vile but lucrative trade in their daughters' virtue. 
Constantino had closed, and apparently destroyed the shrine 
on the score of the licentiousness of the rites there practised. 
A church was erected in its place: a community of holy 
virgins replaced the 'priestesses' of Venus. This Christian 
travesty of what had been, bitterly galled the Pagan patrons 
of the shrine. For years they brooded revengefully, but ini- 
potently. On the accession of Julian, leave was given to 
leopen the temple. The elated Pagans were wild with joy. 
The time for retaliation had come. Cyril the deacon who 'in 
the reign of Constantino, fired with godly zeal, had broken in 
pieces many of the sacred idols V was seized, killed and dis- 
embowelled by the savage mob. Fitly to inaugurate old 
forms of Venus- worship, the holy virgins were stripped naked, 
publicly exposed, and after every indignity ripped up, and 

1 Soz. V. XV. 'IS marks the distinction. ' Even in such outbreaks,' he 
adds, ' one must ascribe the blame to the Emperor ; for he did not put the 
laws in execution upon such offenders : from aversion to Christianity, while 
pretending to rebuke, he really encouraged the wrong doers. ' Persecutions 
at Bostra are cited by way of example. 

2 No precise mark of time is given, but perhaps there is a reasonable 
probability that the Heliopolitans did not wait for more than six months of 
the new regime before restoring their temple. Authorities are Greg. Naz. 
Or. IV. 87, p. 616 b, Soz. v. 10, Theod. iii. 7, Theoph. i. p. 73, Chron. Pasch. 
I. p. 546, Euinart, p. 507, Kedren. i. p. 533. 

^ Theod. III. vii. 3. 

R. E. 12 



178 JULIAN, 

their entrails flung to the pigs. Such is the account of 
Sozomen, and we do not hear of condign punishment being 
inflicted on the offenders. 
Ascalon Tiicodoret* gives a very similar story of outrage on Chris- 

and Oaza. ^^^^ priests and virgins at Ascalon and Gaza. In case of the 
latter we have a more particular account of the martyrdom 
of the brothers Eusebius, Nestabus and Zeno ^ In the dark 
days of Paganism the three had been conspicuous for the 
insults and injuries they heaped on the temples and images 
of the Gods. At the time of the reaction they were im- 
prisoned and then scourged. Their taunts and mutual 
exhortations enraged the bystanders to such heat, that women 
with their bodkins, cooks with boiling water, and roughs 
with sheer force of hauling and tossing and bruising worried 
to death their helpless victims. What is important to notice 
is that the whole affair was an unpremeditated outburst of 
passion, not any systematised persecution: and further, that 
'the perpetrators, as soon as sober reflection revealed the true 
nature of their excesses, seriously dreaded sharp chastisement 
from the imperial justice: reports of Julian's vexation went 
abroad, and that he even thought of decimating the mob who 
were implicated V The sequel, as Sozomen gives it, must 
in fairness be added. The rumour of the Emperor's anger 
turned out mere gossip. So far from even blaming the popu- 
lace, Julian deposed the governor of the district of his oftice, 
giving him to understand that his previous leniency [pre- 
sumably towards Christians] looked suspicious, and that he 
had exceeded his rights in putting the ringleaders of the riot 
under arrest. 'What need to arrest the fellows,' he said, 

1 Theod. III. vii. 1. It is clear that borrowing from Greg. Naz. he has 
referred to Gaza the incidents which Sozomen locaUses at HeHopohs. 
Gregory's account is open to either rendering. 

2 Soz. V. 9, Theoph. i. p. 73, Nikeph. x. 8. Then.- Acts are found in 
Buinart. Here once more chronological precision is unattainable. There 
seems quite as much probability that the outrage was the sequel of the 
Maiuma and Gaza award, recounted later, p. 185. The anxiety however of 
those implicated suggests perhaps an earlier date, so — to be sure of not 
treating Julian too handsomely — I have placed it here. Miicke takes ad- 
vantage of Soz.'s ' so it is said ' to reject the tale. 

8 Soz. V. 9. 



PERSECUTION. 179 

'for retaliating on a few Galileans for all the wrongs they 
had done to them and the Gods?' Here therefore, if Sozo- 
raen's tale be true^, we have an esc post facto implication of 
Julian in a passionate outburst of persecution. 

The records of acts of desecration are curiously scanty; x»es(?cra- 
perhaps from their very commonness^ they became so much a **°^" 
matter of course, that to enumerate them was beneath the 
dignity of history. Samples however are not wanting. In- 
dependently of the confiscation of church vessels, as at Antioch 
or Csesarea, accompanied by acts of grossest profanation, 
Sebaste^ was stripped of her treasured relics, the reputed 
bones of Elisha and of John the Baptist, while at Emesa* the 
Pagans burnt the martyrs' shrines and rededicated the church 
to Dionysus Gynnis (yvvvt^;), setting up withal a grotesque 
image of the androgynous deity; some similar profanation 
took place at Epiphania^ in Syria, and Ambrose® speaks of 
two Christian basilicas being fired by the Jews. At Paneas' 
(C«sarea Philippi), the miracle-working statue of Jesus was 
thrown from its pedestal in the sacristy of the Church, and 
ruthlessly broken in fragments. 

Under our present head no other instances of persecution Summary. 
with bloodshed are alleged with any pretence to exactitude, in 
the earlier months of Julian's reign. To summarise then the 
results so far obtained. First, the instances are surprisingly 
few, three at most: secondly, individuals only were assailed, 
not classes : thirdly, each case is of the nature of an outburst 
of passion, nothing approaching methodical persecution 

^ The story, coming on Sozomen's sole authority, reads curiously enough : 
he appears to be thinking of an anecdote of Greg. Naz. against Julian, which 
belongs to a different time and occasion, viz. the destruction of the Temple 
of Fortune at Csesarea (cf. Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 92, 93). We are not told 
who formed the deputation, or in what dress the facts were brought before 
the Emperor. 

3 Greg. Naz, Or. iv. 86, 613 c, 

3 PhUost. VII. 4, Theod. in. vii. 2, Chron. Pasch. i. p. 546, Giykas, iv. 
p. 470. Elisha (cf. Nikeph.) appears to be a later addition, and is probably 
a mere mistake for ' the second Elisha.' 

* Theod. III. vii. 5, Chron. Pasch. i. p. 547. This was the work of the 
townsmen, not officials. Misop. 357 c, 361 a. 

5 Chron. Pasch. i. p. 547. "^ Amb. Ep. 40, p. 949 sq. 

7 Philost. VII. 3, Soz. V. 21, Giykas, iv. p. 470, Kedx. i. p. 534. 

12 2 



ISO JULIAN. 

occurs: finally, every instance is distinctly retaliative, and the 
provocation given was considerable\ On the whole we infer 
that during Julian's earlier months there wore quite remark- 
ably few cases of intolerance proceeding to bloodshed: and 
that the Emperor's influence must have been, as more than 
once we have proof that it was, strongly exerted on the side 
of peace and toleration. 

We have next to handle the reported instances of official 
persecution, and to consider how far they reflect upon Julian. 

The first case for notice is that of S. ^Emilian. He was 
a young soldier, resident at Dorostolus, a town in Thrace. 
Pagan worship, for some time in abeyance, having been rein- 
augurated there under the impulse of court favour, ^milian, 
indignant at what he deemed a sacrilegious insult, made his 
way into the temple, overturned the altars, and flung sacri- 
fices and libations right and left. For this offence he was 
brought to the bar of Capitolinus, scourged, and put to a cruel 
death by burning. His punishment calls for two remarks. 
First, by medieval and more modern use death by burning 
became more or less the monopoly of religious misdemea- 
nours, but Roman law appears to have recognised it still as 
a penalty for purely political offences^. Secondly, as to the 
severity of the punishment. The Church has canonised S. 
iEmilian, we are told^ owing to the disproportion between 

^ It may also be noticed that all tlie instances are drawn from the East. 
To insist on this too strongly would be unwarrantable. The fact is, writers 
themselves as a rule have repeated for the most part the charges of 
Gregory of Nazianzus, whose sources of information were confined to the 
East. Euinart, Acta Mart. p. 507, alludes to martyrs at Eome, mentioning 
the names of the brothers John and Paul, but all evidence is wanting. 
A mass is appropriated to them in the Gelasian Missal, but their pretended 
Acts are apocryphal. Tillemont, Hist. Eccl. vii. 350 pp., more than exhausts 
the subject. De Broglie (L'Eglise, &c. iv. p. 294 note) is probably right in 
concluding that there was little or no persecution in the Western Empire. 

2 Cf. Amm. M. xxii. iii. 11. From Jul. Ei[). 74, where there is an allusion 
to the burning of Paul ' the Chain,' the Emperor might appear to have dis- 
approved and even abrogated death by burning. But the old barbarian 
aldovvra must give way to avdovvra, and the reference consequently becomes 
obscm'ed if not obliterated. 

3 Cf. De Broglie, iv. p. 182, where the narrative is as usual somewhat 
richly coloured. Sokr. and Soz. do not mention, while Thcod. iii. 7 devotes 



PERSECUTION. 181 

liis offence and its chastisement. Now sacrilege by the 
Roman code was by no means a venial peccadillo : still more, 
at a time when public feeling was perilously tense, when a 
taunt or a prank might have proved the signal for a general 
riot, exploits like that of -^milian could not but become 
dangerously incendiary in character, and merit corresponding 
severity of treatment. 

Another cardinal instance of savage zeal against Christian AmacMus. 
sacrilege is that of the prefect Amachius^. At Merus in 
Phrygia the decaying temple had been by official order re- 
stored, and the statues belonging to it cleaned and replaced. 
Such proceedings incensed the Christians, and one morning 
the guardian of the temple woke to find the cherished 
statues shivered in pieces. The prefect was not unnaturally 
enraged: to shelter the innocent from his anger, the real 
perpetrators, three young Phrygians named Macedonius, Theo- 
dulus, and Tatian, generously surrendered to justice. They 
were granted the option of offering sacrifice, but scornfully 
refused thus to redeem their guilt. They suffered torture 
with great constancy, and as the terrible penalty of their 
sacrilege were slowly roasted to death. 

Ankyra was another place at which the strife of parties Ankyra 
appears to have been both violent and confused. Perhaps ^''^^^j,;;^ 
the prospect or the realisation of the Emperor's presence in 
the town stimulated zeal into fanaticism. We read^ of a 
certain Busiris, of the sect of the Encratites, who for insults 
against the Pagans was arrested by order of the Governor, 
tortured and imprisoned, and only released on the news of 
Julian's death. Genellus, we are briefly told, was crucified ^ 
But in the case of S. Basil of Ankyra we have far more pun- 
gent particularities ^ This fiery young presbyter ^ had been put 

only two lines to iEmilian, S, Jer. in Euseb. Chron,, Chron. Pasch. i. p. 549, 
Nikeph. x. 9. 

1 Sok. HI. 15, Soz. V. si, 1—3, Nikeph. x. 10. 

^ Soz. V. xi. 4 — 6. ^ Ruinart, Acta Mart, 507. 

^ Ruinart, Acta Mart. 510 pp., Nikeph. x. 10. 

5 He had aspired to the see of Ankyra, and the recent elevation of 
Eudoxius to the office proved a considerable mortification to him. Philost. 
E. H. IV. 6. See Soz. v. xi. 10, 11. 



182 JULIAN. 

under arrest for insults publicly offered to persons engaged in 
sacrifice, and for seditious preaching in the streets. Brought 
befonj the bar of Saturninus the Proconsul, and exhibiting 
nothing but the most uncompromising defiance, he was 
fiogged and imprisoned. There he was visited by a special 
imperial commissioner Pegasius, whom he taunted with 
apostasy. After a second hearing before the Proconsul, Basil 
was remanded until the arrival of the Emperor \ Julian sum- 
moned the saint before his tribune. His efforts to convince 
him of the foolishness of Christianity were met with re- 
proaches and anathemas. 'Misguided man,' said the Em- 
peror at last, 'I wished to set you free; as you do but reiterate 
insult, and spurn my advice, and treat me to one affront 
after another, the dignity of Empire requires that seven strips 
be flayed from your body every day.' In the sequel we are 
told how the confessor cast one of the ordained strips in the 
Emperor's face, saying, 'Take, Julian, the food you relish.' 
His indignant warder forthwith made the daily flaying more 
severe, and on Julian's departure for Antioch ended his slow 
torture by execution. Wlien brought to the block all traces 
of the martyr's scars had miraculously^ disappeared, so that 
his body was presented to the executioner pure and whole 
as his soul was to the Saviour! As the irons heated white 
hot were plunged into his entrails, he fell into a sweet sleep 
and died! The Acts intimate, what Sozomen's more sober 
account states explicitly, that his death was contrary to the 
Emperor's will. 
Summanj. The evidence^ is now duly ranged and marshalled, which 
will enable the reader to distinguish equitably between 
Julian and his subordinates. In times of great religious 
excitement embittered partisans invariably outrun their 
orders. It was so at Ankyra: it was so later at Alexan- 
dria, where fines and corporal punishments were inflicted, 

1 This fixes the date to June 362, when Julian was jom-neying from 
Constantinople to Antioch. 

" The miracle might cause temporary uneasiness to the most creclulous. 

3 It will he observed that there is no recorded instance of official perse- 
cution of the Christians on the score of religion, without aggressive provoca- 
tion on their part. 



PERSECUTION. 183 

we read, 'beyond the Imperial instructions \' In such cases 
their party is made responsible for their excesses, and not 
altogether unjustly. But an individual leader of a party is 
morally innocent, if he has neither inflamed nor approved 
such outrageous exhibitions of zeal. By this standard, no 
man can rate Julian's culpability very high. On the whole, 
whether we regard the dealings of citizens with one another 
or of governors with their subordinates, we may fairly con- 
gratulate all parties concerned on the general restraint put 
upon actions iu an age when sectarian animosities, alike in 
feeling and in word, ran very strong. Since the promulga- 
tion of the Edict of Milan principles of tolerance had made 
enormous strides. Christians as a body, whatever may have 
been the conduct of a Constantias or of not a few scheming 
prelates, had not yet renounced tenets which during three 
centuries of oppression they had urged importunately. It 
had come to the turn of the Pagans to advocate like prin- 
ciples in their own interest — and this was done now as before 
not only by Julian, but by most leading Hellenists, eminently 
by the most representative of all, Libanius. Hence it came 
about that only a few individual, and it may almost be added 
pardonable, instances of persecution resulted from the spas- 
modic reintroduction of an abandoned State-religion, in 
defiance of the sentiments of the subjects at large. For these 
stories of persecution entirely corroborate what is certain 
from other sources, namely, that Christianity was at this time 
consciously the winning religion. They prove that the bureau- 
cratic machinery of a perfectly centralised despotism was 
impotent seriously to check Christianity, nay had a struggle 
even to vindicate its proper rights and secure respect for its 
established ceremonial. Where persecution did occur, it was 
provoked, if not necessitated, by Christians: Christians took 
the initiative in intolerance. Nor need this surprise. There 
is a noble intolerance which Christianity has always avowed; Christian 
laying claim to be universal, she has never patiently acqui- "**'''^" 
esced in the triumph or coexistence of a rival: never, except 
when palsied by corruption or indifference. It is theoretically 
1 Sok. III. 14. 



IS4 



JULIAN. 



Cf. Ep. 52. 

430" u c 



Julian's 
implica- 
tion. 



impossible for any luuvcrsal religion to make truce with 
rival systems. To do so were an abdication of right, a con- 
fession of falseness. But Christianity has too often forgotten 
the sphere to which alone this noble intolerance may extend. 
She has confounded with it a bastard intolerance, unchris- 
tian in aim and action, intruding itself beyond the proper 
sphere of religion into outer spheres of thought, or science, or 
law, or policy, or even brute violence. Such was the case 
with Christianity at this epoch. No sooner had it attained 
legal equality with other religions than it claimed superiority; 
no sooner had superiority been granted, than elate with 
success it claimed autocracy and summoned State police to 
its assistance. A Pagan reaction, a reassertion of trampled 
superstitions, was a startling surprise. Astonished Christians 
used illegitimate means of resistance; not only breach of 
courtesy or breach of charity, but stubborn breach of law, was 
accounted a fair weapon for the fight. Nay even offensive 
tactics were adopted: Pagans had to seek protection from 
the law. Christianity had mistaken her right sphere of 
intolerance, and needed to be taught her error. For this 
end severe punishments were often necessary. And perse- 
cution is no right name for the assertion of the paramount 
maje.sty of law over the freaks of unruly citizens. 

Finally, confining ourselves still to the earlier months of 
the reign, we consider Julian's personal implication in acts of 
persecution. The tenor of his laws, and to some extent his 
idea of the relations between Church and State are already 
before us. The simple remembrance of the principles therein 
embodied will explain many damaging charges. Oct. 20 was 
consecrated by the Greek and Latin Churches to the memory 
of Artemius, military prefect in Egypt, whom Theodoret^ re- 
presents as stripped of his goods and beheaded by 'the most 
humane' Emperor for his zeal against idols in the days of 
Constantius^. In reality, a worthy successor to Sebastian, he 

1 Theod. III. 18. 

^ Chron Pasch. similarly records his death, -which Nikeph. x. xi. further 
imputes partly to his having conveyed the bones of S. Andi-ew, S. Luke and 
S. Timothy from Patra3, Achaia, and Ephesus to Constantinople. It did 
not take place till after Julian's arrival at Antioch. Amm. M. xsii. xi. 2. 



PERSECUTION. 185 

was the detested abettor of the infamous Bp. George, whose 
iniquities and exactions' he upheld by military violence, and 
was put to death for civil not religious offences, one main 
allegation being complicity in the death of Gallus. 

At Kyzikus the Novatian Church had been destroyed by Kyzikus. 
Eleusius the orthodox bishop of the town^ He was peremp- 
torily required to rebuild it, and at a subsequent period was 
apparently banished by the Emperor from his see. At the same 
time Sozomen^, who gives us the information, does not conceal 
that the assigned cause was political agitation. The offences 
named are desecration, and damage inflicted on Pagan 
shrines; institution of widows' houses, and establishments for 
sisterhoods; proselytism; introduction of bodies of Christian 
partisans into the town; organisation of anti-Pagan demon- 
strations, more particularly among the important guilds of 
the wool-workers and coin-casters. 

Julian was naturally brought into constant contact with 
Christianity in his judicial functions. In one instance a 
whole town is said to have been prejudiced by the unjudicial 
religious animosities of the judge. Maiuma, the Piraeus* of 3iaiuma. 
Gaza, for its devotion to Christianity, was elevated by Constan- 
tine to the rank of an independent city, and was christened 
Constantia after its benefactor's son. The Pagans of Gaza 
were violently jealous of their upstart dependents. The story 
of Eusebius and Nestabus has shown what extremes religious 
feuds reached. The independence of Maiuma was an injury 
as well as an insult, and one too ever present in a galling 
form. On Julian's accession the Gazseans laid a plea before 
the Emperor. Be it that, as Christian historians say, he 

1 George appears to have levied arbitrary dues on baptism, burial, and 
other church rites, besides enjoying profitable monopolies in saltpetre, salt 
and paper. De Broglie, L'Eglise, &c. iv. 75. Mr Johnson, p. 47, summa- 
rising Artemius' virtues, writes, ' The whole business amounts to no more 
than this, that he was a Good, Godly, Lawful, Wicked, Profane, Sacrilegi- 
ous Image-breaker!' Cf. Amm. M. xxii. xi. 2, Nikeph. x. xi. p. 30. 

2 Sok. III. 11, Soz. V. 5. 

3 Soz. V. 15 supported, or rather quoted, by Nikeph. x. v. p. 17, x. xx. p. 44. 
* Soz. V. 3, Nikeph. x. 4. The harbour suburb stood some two and a half 

miles from the main town. This piece of arbitration is usiially, and I do not 
doubt rightly, referred to Julian's residence at Antioch, but I know of no- 
evidence absolutely defining the exact date : see however, p. 178, »(. 2. 



186 JULIAN. 

took especial delight in undoing the work of Constantine and 
Constantius, or rather that in pursuance of his avowed policy 
he desired to disconnect political and material advantages 
from religious creed, Julian rescinded the privileges and im- 
munities conferred by Constantius. At the same time while 
unifying the municipal organisation, he retained the twofold 
episcopal jurisdiction initiated by Constantine. The decision 
does not bear the stamp of a very violent odium theologicum, 
and taken alone cannot substantiate a charge of persecution 
against Julian. 

Julian on In his personal demeanour as a judge Julian aimed at 

the bench. • ■ • j.* tj. tt j. ^ • ^ 

preservmg rigorous irapartiahty. Jble was too loquacious and 

argumentative, too fussy^ and inquisitive, perhaps even too 
sensitive and too anxious after certainty, to be a really power- 
ful judge. But he spared no pains and prided himself on his 
strict fairness. It was characteristic of the man to inquire ** 
of each pleader what religion he professed, if only to certify 
to himself as well as to others his superiority to all preju- 
dice. Anecdotes even like that of S. Basil of Ankyra, stripped 
of their sensational appendages, fairly bear out Ammian's 
verdict that 'neither religion nor anything else made him 
swerve from the path of equity^.' 
Maris, Bp. As an individual moreover, even when most nearly touched, 
of Chaice- j^g seems to have exercised the same self-control as in his 

don. 

oflficial guise. Considering the impetuosity of his character, 
and not less the vanity which again and again peeps through 
the philosopher's mask, the following incident* does Julian 
no small credit. The scene is laid at Constantinople, the 
imperial city. There the Emperor before assembled multi- 
tudes was doing public sacrifice to the Genius of the City. 
An old blind man is led in, Maris, the bishop of Chalcedon, 
Interrupting the solemn service, he brands the Emperor aloud 
with the title of Heathen and Apostate. Julian with charac- 
teristic^ want of dignity, taunted him with his blindness. 

1 'In disceptando aliquotieus erat iutempesti^nis,' says Amm. M. xxu. 
X. 2, criticising him as a judge, but cf. p. 131, n. 4. ^ Amm. M. xxii. x. 2. 

3 Amm. M. xxii. x. 2 ; cf. xnii. i. 2 — 4; xxii, is. 9—12, x. 1 — 7; xxv. 
iv. 7—9, 19. 

^ Sok. III. 12, Soz. V. 4, Theopb. i. p. 74, Zonar. xiii. 12, Kedr. i. p. 535. 

' At the same time the story we must remember has passed through the 



PERSECUTION. 187 

*- 

'Be sure,' lie said, 'your Galilean God will never heal you.' 
'Nay,' answered Maris, 'I thank God for my blindness, that 
has spared me the sight of an apostate!' The Emperor had 
by this time recovered his composure, and without a word 
passed quietly out of the building. Of these earlier months 
better words could hardly be found than the terse summary 
of the Christian chronicler, who describes Julian's policy as 
'a gentle violence that strove to win not drive \' i 

But as months went by Julian, we are told, grew em- Julian 
bittered. In the words of Theodoret, 'Then did Julian begin 2IiJ*^;j_ 
more openly or rather more shamelessly to wage war upon 
the faith. Wearing a mask of clemency, he set snares and 
pitfalls to catch the unwary and bring them to everlasting 
perdition.' There was much to tempt it. In his policy of 
persistent toleration he stood almost solitary. It proved 
neither so easy nor so triumphant as he had anticipated. It 
was too often interpreted as conscious weakness by enemies, 
as a stupid scrupulosity by friends. Pagans besieged him 
with importunities; Christians nettled him by ingratitude. 
As fear subsided, sectarian animosities swelled more turbu- 
lently. Julian set out for the East bent on maintaining the 
same policy he had hitherto pursued. In his progress through 
Asia he was met constantly by indifference, not seldom by open 
derision. He was compelled to avoid or hurry by the more 
Christian towns. Arrived at Antioeh, his tone assumes a 
sterner type. Writings and acts alike betray his mortification. 
It is this period we must now examine more minutely. His 
changed temper is evident in his correspondence. He chafes 
more irritably under opposition; he condescends to pettier 
expedients. Vexation sours his generosity: irritation distorts 
his sense of justice. His imperial acts faithfully reflect the 
personal asperities into which he was galled. 

An instance of this is furnished by Julian's letter to the JuUanand 

people of Bostra^ dating from the earliest part of his residence ^Uins!^^'^^' 

mint of Sozomen. Perhaps Julian alluded to his physical infirmity as a fair 
emblem of the moral or intellectual darkness that encompassed him. 

1 'Blanda persecutio illiciens magis quam impellens ad sacrificandum. ' i 
S. Jer. Euseb. Chron. pp. 50.S, 504. ' 

'■^ Ep. 52. Little is added by Soz. v. 15, Tlieoph. i. p. 7-1, &'c. 



1(S8 JULIAN. 

at Autiocb. It can hardly be omitted iu the pi'esent cou- 
nexion, though strictly it involves meanness, rather than 
violence, in the endeavour to put down Christianity. At 
Bostra^ much party rancour had been displayed. The rival 
religious factions were numerically well balanced, and the 
clergy seem to have incited the mob to various misdemea- 
nours. Titus, however, the bishop, had at any rate done 
his utmost to appease irritation, and, the storm having abated, 
wi'ote to Julian to say that the Christians, though a fair 
match for the Pagans, had been restrained by his exhortations 
from any excesses. Thereupon Julian, trumping up a paltry 
charge against Titus of stigmatising the citizens to belaud 
himself, advises the Bostrenians to drive out their bishop as 
a slanderer. So petty a piece of backbiting was received, it 
may be hoped, with the contempt it merited. In such con- 
duct the Pagans found an incentive to persecution, outweigh- 
ing many maxims of toleration ^ 
Julian and Referring at a venture to this same period^ the letter that 
j^] ^3 deals with the Christians of Edessa, we have in it another 
display of signally bad taste, if no worse charge is involved. 
Constantius^ had handed over the great basilica of the place, 
dedicated to S. Thomas the Apostle, to the Arian faction. 
The Yalentinians however formed a considerable party in the 
town. Internecine war raged between the two sects; till the 
weaker were suppressed by a series of atrocities, disgraceful 
to any civilised community. Hereupon Julian made the 
wealthy Arians feel the weight of imperial displeasure, by 
handing over the ecclesiastical funds to the resident military, 
and confiscating the church domain to fiscal uses. The 
punishment may have been deserved^, but whether that be 

1 Tourlet, whom Talbot follows, supposes tlie Bostra in Ai-abia (cf. Amm. 
M. XIV. viii. 13) is tlie town addressed, 

" Soz. V. XV. 13. 

3 There appears no satisfactory evidence as to the exact date of the 
letter. On the way to his Persian expedition Julian hurried past Edessa, in 
displeasui'e at the Christianity of the townsmen (Soz. vi. i. 1), a more rea- 
sonable prejudice perhaps than Soz. or Theod. (in. 2(5) would lead us to 
suspect. 

^ Sok. IV. xviii. 

' There are Rood reasons for interpreting Julian's conduct thus favour- 



PERSECUTION. 189 

SO or not, Julian had no right to add the scornful remark 
that such a deprivation of goods would minister for them a 
readier entrance into that kingdom of heaven for which they 
looked. It is just such a pettish unjudicial remark as reflects 
doubt on the justice of the sentence itself. 

Julian's treatment of Csesarea, in time^ probably as inJulianavd 
kind, belongs to this period. This town^ the metropolis of 
Cappadocia, had in years gone by been adorned with three 
handsome temples, two of which, those namely of Jupiter 
and Apollo, had been razed during the reign of Constantius. 
When Julian's policy of toleration became known, the town- 
council proceeded to demolish the surviving shrine sacred to 
the Genius of the State. Julian, indignant at this open 
defiance of his known sentiments, avenged the breach of state- 
law by penalties similar to but severer than those inflicted 
at Edessa. Not only were orders given for the immediate 
restoration of the temples, the confiscation of the ecclesiasti- 

ably. The fanaticism of parties at Edessa is exemplified by the stubborn 
zeal of Christians there in the reign of Valens. The basilica of S. Thomas, 
as well as the other churches, being in the hands of the Arians, the orthodox 
Catholics used to muster in a plain immediately outside the walls (Soz. vi. 
18, Sok. IV. 18). Valens, with the concmTence it maybe assumed of the 
Arians, ordered a general massacre : whereupon women and children hurried 
to the spot, that they might not miss the glory of expected martyrdom. 
Further, none of the Church historians adduce Julian's treatment of Edessa 
as an instance of persecution : this would be decisive, were it not that here- 
tics were the people affected. 

1 Soz. V. 4, dates these occurrences vaguely as about synchronous with 
Julian's arbitration between Gaza and Maiuma (see p. 185), but implies that 
they did not long precede Julian's death. The spurious letter announcing 
to Basil the penalties inflicted on the town may be correct in its assumption 
of being written on the eve of the Persian campaign. The letter in question 
(Ep. 75) is derived only from the collection of letters of Basil (the Great), 
and is rejected by the best editors. It is not the least in Julian's style : it is 
filled with the strangest bombast: it introduces tribes unknown to geo- 
graphies, and words unknown to lexicons : it contains more than one gram- 
matical solecism, and closes with a well-known jeu d'esprit of Julian, which 
in the context is absolutely deprived not merely of point, but of bare sense. 
Neither Gregory nor the Church Historians were cognisant of its contents. 
Teuffel in Schmidt's Zeitsch. filr Gesch. 1845, Vol. iv. 160 pp. refers it on the 
internal evidence of language to a Christian hand. 

2 Soz. V. 4, Nikeph. x. 4, Theoph. i. p. 73. 



190 JULIAN. 

cal estates, and the imposition of a fine of 300 lbs. of gold', 
but a capitation-tax was levied on all Christians, the prefect 
was deposed and banished, and the ecclesiastics degraded to 
the most costly and humiliating kind of military service'^. 
We are told" conjecturally that a certain noble, Eupsychius, 
was put to death with others of his co-religionists, but against 
the will of the Emperor. If Sozomen is correct in his facts, 
the penalty decreed was certainly severe*, though hardly 
exceeding the provocation. 
Jtdian and To turn from Asia to Africa, Alexandrian politics' engaged 
<?//rt""" a considerable share of Julian's attention. At his accession 
Georpc of the SCO was occupied by the unscrupulous George. Armed 
dria. violence of Constantius' agent had banished the lawful bishop 
Athanasius, and replaced him after horrible scenes of outrage 
and desecration by this infamous successor. The adherents 
of Athanasius, numbering all the better Christians of the 
town, had perforce tolerated the bishop whom in their hearts 
they hated: meanwhile in secret they were guided by the 
councils, and looked longingly for the return, of the fugitive 
Athanasius himself. George's real support was derived first 
from the Arian Court which had nominated him, afterwards 
from the rude soldiery who obeyed the governor's beck. No 
sooner had this governor Artemius, and some of his most 
guilty accomplices in crime expiated their past misdeeds 
before the bar of Julian's special tribunal, than George was 
left at the mercy of the citizens. For indeed Bishop George 
was yet more execrated by Pagans than by orthodox Chris- 
tians. He violated their sanctuaries alike in word and act ; 
he forbade their worship, openly threatening to set light to 
'the death-vault,' as he contemptuously designated the prin- 

^ Ep. 75 converts 300 into 1000, and tlireatens to raze the entii-e town, 
building temples and shrines from the ruins of the principal edifices. 

2 Commentators are at a loss to explain this. The lowest form of 
military service, sc. the cohortalis, was the least expensive. Doubtless 
Gregory {Or. iv. p. 92 a) means the worst remunerated. 

3 Soz, V. xi. 7, 8, Nikeph. x. 10. 

* How much of the decree was executed and how much 'prevented by 
Julian's death ' is not left very clear by Soz. 

^ Amm. M. xxii. xi, Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 86 and xxi., Philost. vii. 2, Sok. 
ni. 2 — 4, Soz. V. 7, Theoph. i. p. 72, Nikeph. x. vi — vii. 



PERSECUTION. 191 

cipal temple' of the place. A certain plot of land too, the 
site of the ancient Mithrium or temple of Mithras, had been 
made over to him for the erection of a church. In clearing 
the foundations a subterranean vault was found, in which 
numerous skulls were discovered, and a variety of grotesque 
implements were found, employed formerly for the inspection 
of livers, and for various bloody and obscene rites that cha- 
racterised the Mithras cult. The bishop wantonl}'' and mor- 
tall}'^ exasperated the heathen population by parading these 
through the streets amid the jeers and hoots of assembled 
crowds^. Riots followed, resulting in the incarceration of the 
bishop : subsequently watching their opportunity, the Pagans 
stormed the prison, dragged out the bishop, and kicked or 
trampled him to death. The disfigured remains they paraded 
through the streets on a camel, finally burning them and 
casting the ashes into the sea. Two imperial officers^, who 
had abetted his crimes, shared his fate. The Christians, 
little caring to defend so unworthy a chief, remained as a 
body passive spectators, certain of the more violent partisans 
of Athanasius actually compromising themselves among the 
Pagan rioters*. To complete the tale, Julian, while acknow- 
ledging and denouncing the criminality of the detestable 
George, rebuked the Alexandrians for their precipitate vio- 
lence in anticipating the hand of justice, and warns them 
that by their inhuman atrocity they had forfeited the good 
opinion of them he had but so lately expressed. He purposed 
at first sharp punishment, but eventually, beyond this rather 
faint reprimand, took no steps to bring the conspicuous cul- 
prits to justice, from respect, he says, to the God Serapis, and 

^ A temple consecrated to the Genius of the town. Amm. M. xxii. xi. 7. 
It was a common gibe, first invented by the Christians, but after the days of 
martyrs effectively retorted upon them by Pagans, to call places of worship 

^ Eode, p. 90 note, rather arbitrarily rejects all this as a fiction of Sokrates. 
On the chronology see Note 6 in Appendix B. 

3 One, Dracontius, had pulled down the altar of Moneta, while the other, 
a zealous church builder, had forced the tonsure upon ungrown boys. Amm. 
M. XXII. xi. 9. 

* Proved by Greg. Naz. Or. xxi. 2fi, while Amm. M. mentions Pagans 
only as actively concerned. 



192 JULIAN. 

to their late governor Julian his uncle. In discerning Pagan 
partialities, which indeed are not far to seek, in this behaviour, 
we must remember that it would have been an extremely 
delicate task to single out the ringleaders and to apportion 
punishments rightly, and further that Roman emperors from 
Caesar downwards had learnt to recognise and, if possible, 
conciliate, the passions of the Alexandrian mob. Julian 
therefore contented himself with providing for the restoration 
and due conservation of George's valuable books to swell his 
private library. 
Athana- Up to this point Athauasius had remained in conceal- 

siuf. ment. Not even Julian's edict in favour of banished bishops 

had tempted him out of the deserts of the Thebais: his 
advent could but have embroiled matters and initiated new 
disturbances and schisms. No sooner however was George 
murdered, than Athanasius re-appeared. His return to the 
city was an ovation, A Christian father^ daringly compares 
his entry into Alexandria to that of the Lord Christ into 
Jerusalem. He came ridino^ on the foal of an ass : before 
him people cast flowers and branches and rich tapestries, 
and shouted in acclaim. He soon showed that he had lost 
none of his old vigour; and yet had added to it increased 
forbearance and discretion. As peacemaker, as pastor, as 
evangelist, he carried all before him. Chagrined at the 
Julian deadness of Pagans, Julian was exasperated at the vitality 
nasius. of 'the Galileans,' The impotence of his own revival was 
a dark contrast to the triumphs of Athanasius, He con- 
tracted a jealous hatred against that great man. He sel- 
dom speaks of him without some opprobrious epithet. 
Scoundrel, knave, adventurer, intriguer, accursed — such are 
^^8(f^" the habitual terms of description '^. He formally charged 
Athanasius with insulting^ and contumelious defiance of law 



^ Greg. Naz. Or. xxi. 29. 

^ To\fi7]p6TaTOS inrb toO avvf^dovi iirapdeis Opdffovs, Ep. 26 — 6 d€o2s ex^pi^, 
6 fiiap6s, Ep. 6 — dvacre^'/is, iravovpyos, iroKvrrpayp.wv, ou8^ dv7)p dXX' dvOpuwla- 
Kos eireXris, Ep). 51 — are the epithets by which Julian, even in state docu- 
ments, describes the great bishop, in whom he discerned only p.oxOr)plav and 
ei'T/s^X"'"' (^P- 51)- 



PERSECUTION. 193 

in thus returning to his see. The edict in favour of 
exiled bishops, he said, contemplated only return to their 
countries, not reinstatement in their sees\ It was an in- 
stance of his habitual lawlessness thus to re-usurp his so- 
called episcopal throne without express permission from the 
Emperor^. Doubtless his conduct was displeasing to all God- 
fearing^ citizens, and he was to depart forthwith from the city, 
the very day, says Julian, on which the letters of our clemency 
come to hand. Disregard of the order would entail a severe 
punishment, A more frank and no less imperious missive Ep. e. 
was at the same time* addressed to Ekdikius the prefect. 
The impious Athanasius, it said, had actually dared to bap- 
tize Pagan ladies of illustrious rank, and that while Julian 
was on the throne. He must forthwith be chased not from 
Alexandria merely, but beyond the confines of Egypt. In 
default of this a fine of 100 lbs. of gold should be levied 
on the prefect's division. The emperor added with his own 
hand a violent postscript closing with the curt fierce inale- 
diction, SicoKeado) — 'persecute him°.' But the 'God-fearing' Alexandri- 
citizens of Alexandria, so far from being displeased with their 'jils pao-t 
prelate, sent a deputation to the Emperor expressly to appeal "^^^ «»■« 
for the revocation of the edict. It was in reply to this depu- 
tation that Julian wrote the well-known despatch in which, Ep. 51. 
contrasting the fatuity of the words of Jesus with the splen- 
dour of the deeds of Alexander of Macedon and the Ptolemies, 
he cries shame on the Alexandrians for their degenerate de- 
clension to that sect, whose spiritual ancestors (nobler far 
than their progeny) had been slaves to the very people whom 

^ Soz. V. XV. 2. 

^ Julian in his pragmatical way urges that Athanasius might at least 
have waited for one edict of recall to annul the many edicts of banishment. 
" ^ deoae^eis, sc. Pagans, as always in Julian's vocabulary. 

* By previous writers Ep. 6 is supposed to have been evoked by Athana- 
sius' contemptuous disregard of Ep. 26 : but Eode, p. 80 note, cleverly urges 
that the contents of Ep. 6 do not bear this out, and that evidence of Atha- 
nasius' passive disobedience is wanting. He suggests that both letters be- 
long to the same time, the first being a despatch to the Alexandrians, the 
second a private memorandum to the governor. 

5 The old reading SccoKeadai, which Gibbon retained, gives impossible Greek 
and feeble sense. Apparently some MSS. omit the word. 

R. E. 13 



194 JULIAN. 

the Alexandrians had subjugated. As for the scheming 
Athanasius, the villain, with whose shifty wiles and teaching 
they were so enchanted, the order for his expulsion^ not from 
Alexandria only but from all Egypt was emphatically re- 
peated. Athanasius once more left his see an exiled with the 
prophetic words that it was a little cloud which would soon 
blow over. Julian's death put a stop to further proceedings; 
but in this case undeniably Julian's antipathies led him first 
to sophistry, which set forced interpretations on plain decrees, 
and then to bitterness which found vent in ill-mannered and 
undignified abuse, and which practically pledged Julian to 
open persecution. In fact no sooner had the bishop been 
chased away, than government officials proceeded to enrich 
themselves at the expense of Christians by exactions^, which 
though unauthorised by Julian and indeed unconstitutional, 
were, if not connived at, at least unpunished by the Emperor. 
Julian and If such was Julian's temper in dealing with outlying 
Antioch. -toT^yj^s and provinces, what treatment did he accord to the 
disputatious townsmen of Christian Antioch? His residence 
there was an unbroken series of petty mortifications: they 
came to a head in what may be called the Babylas riot, which 
The Bahy- ^g significant enough to merit detailed description. .. At the 
stration. hamlet of Daphne adjoining^ Antioch was the famous oracular 
spring of Castalia, which since the days of Hadrian had 
remained sealed from the eyes of men^. The prophecy that 
he should one day be Emperor was the last it had been 
suffered to announce. Julian, with the morbid curiosity and 
superstition that characterised him, desired to consult the 

1 According to Theod. iii. ix. 2, Julian ordered the execution of Athana- 
sius. No other historian corroborates the charge— (the Narrat. ad Ammon. 
in Athan. Op. p. 979 speaks only of his expecting a sentence of death)— 
while Julian's own despatches contradict it. Even if they are incomplete, 
Greg. Naz. (cf. Or. xxi. xxxii. p. 407) would certainly not have passed over 
the decree, had it been historical. Theoph. i. p. 74 expressly attributes 
the sentence of banishment to pressure exercised on Julian by Hellenes. 

2 Euf. I. xxxiv. p. 259, Theod. iii. ix. 2, Soz. v. xv. 3, Sok, iii. xiv. 1, 
Kedr. i. p. 536. ^ Sok, in. xiv. 7. 

* The grove was some five miles from the centre of the city, Soz. v. xix. 
17 : according to Eufiuus i. 35, nearly six. 
s Amm. M. xxii. xii. 8, Soz. v. xix. 11. 



PERSECUTION. 195 

sacred fount. He ordered the stones to be removed. The 
oracular voice was dumb; from the pollution, 'twas said, of 
bodies that lay within the holy precincts. Sacrifices and liba- 
tions could only extract a muffled reiteration, 'The dead! 
The dead!' Among the bones that lay there, were those of 
the holy Baby las of Antioch, martyr and bishop \ In their 
presence demons could find no voice to speak. By the Em- 
peror's order, the spot was to be disenchanted of the spell by 
the most approved -propitiatory rites. The removal of the 
honoured bones gave occasion for a mass demonstration on 
the part of the Christians of Antioch. Men, women, and 
children gathered in organised procession, and as they wound 
along the streets, behind the bier, sang aloud in chorus of 
antiphonal chanting, 'Confounded be all they that worship 
graven images, and that delight in vain gods.' Again and 
again the triumphant denunciation of the Psalmist rang along 
the streets, as in the old time when Israel welcomed the ark 
to the hill of Sion. But the monarch was not now amonaf 
the dancers .or singers. As he listened to that chorus of 
menace he rued bitterly the ill-judged order he had given; 
he issued an edict '^prohibiting funerals in the day-time : they 
were, said the decree, inauspicious, inconvenient, and to by- 
standers distasteful: henceforth obsequies were to take place 
at night, and to be occasions for mourning, not for parade or 
ostentation. This was not all : he pondered schemes of 
counter demonstrations, or revenge. While he thus brooded, 
a still more stinging injury trod close upon the last^ 

The magnificent shrine of Apollo stood sequestered amid Temple of 
deep groves of cypress, myrtle and bay, commemorating the jj^^J;'^^ 
metamorphosis of Daphne. Within,- at the very spot where 
the kind earth had sheltered the nymph from her amorous 
pursuer, towered a colossal figure of the god overlaid with 
gold, and bending earthward with the golden libation cup ; 
the statues and fountains had been renovated; the gardens 

1 Sok. III. 18, Theocl. iii. s. 2, Euseb. H. E. vi. 29. They had been 
transferred to the spot by Julian's brother GaUus, on purpose to confound 
the demons and their worshippers. For following details cf . also Euf. i. 35, 
Philost. VII. 8, Soz. V. 19, Theod. ni. 10—11, Amm. M. xxii. 13. 

2 Theod. Cod. ix. xvii. 5. ^ Amm. M. xxii. xiii. 1. 

13—2 



361c. 



196 JULIAN. 

smiled with choice exotics; all had been done to charm back 
the tutelar deity to his consecrated haunt. One night^ the 
city was roused by the glare of a conflagration; at daybreak 
nothing of the great temple remained but charred walls and 
blackened columns standing amid a heap of ashes. How the 
fire arose was never ascertained : one probable account'^ asserts 
that a Pagan philosopher had left a burning taper on the 
altar where he had placed his offerings. Whatever the true 
caused accident, malice, or as the Christians said the descent 
of fire from heaven, Julian at least had no doubt it was the 
handiwork of 'the atheists.' The principal church of Antioch 
Mis. 346 B, was closed*, and the sacred vessels removed : at least one young 
Christian hero° was placed on the rack. For the livelong 
.day, from dawn till the tenth hour, hung Theodore upon the 
cruel horse, bearing the stinging torture of the harrowing 
hooks and the smart of the branding iron. ' Again and again 
he chanted the triumphant refrain, 'Confounded be all they 
that worship carved images;' and in after times would tell* 
how there had seemed to stand beside him in those hours of 
trial a young man who wiped away the sweat of agony wath 
a fine linen cloth, and sprinkled over him cool water, so that 
the rapture of the vision took from him all sense of pain. 
From such a sufferer as this no information could be gained; 

^ I have found the statement repeated that the fire took place on the 
night preceding the grand feast of inauguration, but have not come across 
it in ancient ■writers. Nor again do I know Gibbon's authority for saying 
the fire took place on the night following the Babylas demonstration, but 
I suspect the less precise ' eodem tempore ' of Amm. M. xxii. xiii. 1. 

2 Amm. M. xxii. xiii. 3. 

3 Cf. Philost. Tii. 8, Theod. iii. xi. 5, Soz. v. xx. 5. Libanius in his 
' Monody on the temple at Daphne ' adds no facts, and hardly an opinion ; 
and this though he was resident at Antioch at the time. 

4 Theod. III. xii. 1. 
s The Acta in Euinart are derived from Eufinus i, 36, from whom Sok. 

III. 19, Soz. V. 20, Theod. m. 11, Aug. de Civ. Dei xviii. 52 and others take 
their accounts. 

6 Eufinus, the historian, heard the tale from the lips of the aged con- 
fessor. Euf. I. 36. The most impartial Eode, p. 74 7iote, accepts only the 
arrest and flogging of Theodorus as historical, and supposes that Theodoras' 
pride over his Confessorship was rather too much for his exact veracitj', so 
that lengthened memory magnified facts. 



PERSECUTION. 197 

he was released by imperial command, nor do we hear of 
other Christians^ being imprisoned or tortured. 

If the purification and the burning of the temple of Publia. 
Daphne were the affronts on the largest scale that Julian 
had to bear, pettier aggravations were not lacking. In a 
principal street of the city lived Publia^ one of the most pro- 
minent Christians in the town : she was mother of John, 
chief of the presbyters, who had more than once declined 
elevation to the Apostolic see of Antioch : herself a widow, 
she had founded a seminary for holy virgins, and superin- 
tended their training in person. Chanting was one of their 
accomplishments : and whenever the Emperor passed, they 
were bidden to sing at the top of their voices : 

"The idols of the heathen are silver and gold, 
The work of men's hands. 
They that make them are like unto them : 
So is every one that trusteth ui them," 

The Emperor ordered the singing to stop when he was pass- 
ing by. Publia, disregarding the injunction, on the next 
occasion incited her choir to strike up, 

"Let God arise, and let his enemies he scattered;" 
and succeeded in eliciting from the Emperor a public repri- 
mand. 

John Malalas and the Paschal Chronicle^ yield an uncor- S. Dome- 
roborated account of the death of the hermit St Dometius. ^"*' 
The holy man had taken up his abode in a certain cave in 
the district of Cyrestica. Crowds resorted thither, to be 
healed of diseases. Julian told him to adhere to his self- 
imposed life of solitude : but the monk responded that he 
could not hinder them that came to him in faith. Then the 
Emperor ordered the cave to be walled up : and the saint 
remaining within died there. 

1 The Pagan aeditui were subjected to the question, and also the presbyter 
Theodoritus if indeed he be a real historical personage. I discuss this point 
in a Note at the end of this Section. Zonar. xiii. 12, p. 26 and Kedr. 
I. p. 537 speak of the presbyters Eugenius and Makarius reaping the crown 
of martyrdom, but whether in immediate connexion with the burning of the 
temple is not clear. ^ Theod. iii. 19. 

3 loan. Malalas, Ghronog. siii. p. 328, Ghron. Pasch. p. 550. 



198 . JULIAN. 

Persecu- It remains to consider a certain class of acts of pcrsecu- 

^ArmT '''^ ^^^^ • ^^^^^> namely, directed against military offenders. The 
standard instance, that of the soldiers at Constantinople*, has 
been already commented on. It has been shown that the 
pimishment inflicted was exacted by the laws of military dis- 
cipline, just as the original ground of offence was a natural 
outcome of the existing relations between Church and State. 
But though neither the punishment of the Constantinopo- 
litan troops, nor kindred instances, deserve to be classed as 
persecutions, it wall at least be fair to set them before the 
reader. 
Valcntini- Valentiuianus, the future Emperor, was, say the historians, 
anm. Captain of the Jovians^ the ' crack corps' of the Imperial 
Guards. As such he would walk immediately behind the 
Emperor on public occasions. One festival-tide he was thus 
in attendance on the Emperor, as he visited the temple of 
Fortune. At the entrance the sacristan sprinkled him with 
the lustral water. Like a good protestant, but a bad soldier, 
he ostentatiously shook otF the drops, and rent away the 
polluted portion of his uniform, by one account actually 
abusing and striking the keeper of the shrine. Julian sub- 
sequently relegated him to the provinces for a military 
offence, but without degrading him from the army^ 

1 Supr. p. 173. 

^ He appears really not to have filled this post till later. Pliilost. vii. 7 
stj'les him Tribune of the Cornuti. So too Chron. Pascli. p. 549, 555. For 
authorities see also Euf. ii. 2, Aug. De Civ. Dei. xyiii. 52, Theod. in. 10, 
Sok. IV. 1, Soz. VI. \i. 4 — 6, Glykas iv. p. 473. 

3 Theod. dramatically makes the exile the immediate punishment of thia 
particular act of insubordination. If, as Soz. precisely affirms, the scene of 
the incident was Gaul and Valentinian was banished to Armenia, we have a 
certain and undesigned proof that the offence and the supposed punishment 
were not immediately connected, for Julian would not at the crisis of his 
fortunes have driven one of his ablest officers to the camp of Coustautius. 
Philost. makes Thebes in Egypt the scene of his exile, and speaks of his 
banishment to Mesopotamia as inflicted by Constantius. But Egypt no less 
than Armenia was under Constantius' jurisdiction. Miicke, p. 249, 282, 
discredits the whole tale as neither Ammiau (in spite of his full accounts), 
nor Greg. Naz., nor Sokrates corroborate it. It seems clear that from 357 
(cf. Amm. M. xvi. xi. 6) until Jovian's accession, when Valentinian re- 
appears as a tribune, he was not serving near Julian's person : and tliis 
tuiuod out a handy peg for the above good story. 



PERSECUTION. 199 

The names of Juventinus and Maximinus are^ enshrined Jmentinm 
in a homily of Chrysostom. They were legionaries and Chris- "j^^^ff*^^' 
tians. At some drinking bout, their hearts and tongues 
were enlarged to cry out against the abominations of the 
heathen reaction : quotiug Scripture^ they said, ' Thou didst 
deliver us into the hands of an unjust king, and the most 
wicked in all the world.' The mutinous words were reported. 
They were arrested and put upon their trial, at which they 
stiffly maintained the spirit of their previous utterances. 
Finally, on the charge of being drunk and disorderly, and 
having been guilty of treasonable language, they were put 
to death. Jan. 25 was kept holy as their day at Antioch', 
the scene of their martyrdom. 

Many others are said to have resigned rank^ or left the Military 
service, rather than deny the faith. The names of three ^°v^^- 
future Emperors, Jovian, Yalentinian, and Valens are given. 
Valentinian's case has been discussed. Jovian held one of 
the highest commands^ in Julian's own army at the time 
of the Emperor's death in the Persian campaign. About 
Yalens corroborative evidence is lacking. To these names 
Paulinus adds that of a certain Victricius®. How easily 
charges of persecution might falsely intrude in such cases is 

1 Chrys. in luv. et Blaxim. Mart.; cf. Acta in Euinart drawn from 
Theod. III. XV. 4—9. Cf. loan. Mai. Ghron. xiii. p. 327. 

2 So7;ig of Three Children, v. 8. Theod.'s version (/Sao-jXet irapavo/x^ 
airocTTdTrj irapa Trdvra to. iOv-q rd ovto, iirt ttjs yijs) is more pointed than the 
Lxx or E. V. If they could talk to such edification in a tavern, is the com- 
ment of Chrys., what manner of men must they have been ui domestic privacy ! 

3 This would he the place to insert the sufferings of the soldiers Bonosus 
and Maximilian, said to have been tortured before Count Julian (not the 
Emperor) for declining to remove the Christian emblems of the labarum. 
But the Acts, derived from a solitary MS. belonging to the monastery of Silva- 
maior, and unsupported from any other quarter, seem, with their hotch- 
potch of horror, miracle and prediction, wholly unworthy of credence. Pref. 
to Homily in Migne. Cf. loan. Mai. 

4 Sok. III. xiii. 3. Cf. Euinart, Acta Mart. The expression ^civTjv diroTl- 
Beadai, sc. cingulum deponere, though normally used of retirement from the 
service, might mean only some form of degradation, cf. Zos. iii. 19. Sokrates, 
if we compare his comments in in. xiii. 2, 3, perhaps only means that men 
professed themselves ready to retire rather than seem to apostatise. 

5 He was ' domesticorum ordinis primus. ' 
^ Ap. Euinart, Acta, p. 506. 



tion. 



200 JULIAN. 

clear from the story of S. Martin. Enlisted at the age of 
fifteen, as a young man of twenty he was serving as a private 
in Julian's army. On the eve of an engagement conviction 
smote him of the wroncrfulness of the soldier's callincj. There- 
upon he declined the donative distributed by the Caesar to 
encourage his troops, and announced his resolution to be 
God's soldier alone. To rebut an undeserved taunt of cow- 
ardice, the Saint professed his readiness to take his usual 
place in the ranks unarmed, relying for safety on the sign of 
the Cross alone. The danger blew over, and Martin re- 
nounced the service. How easily might this incident, which 
belongs to the period of Julian's Coesarship* when he still 
professed the faith, be twisted into a charge of persecution ! 
As it is he by no means escapes hard names from the pious 
narrator. 
Alleged Julian's educational policy is so important as to demand 

j)ersccxi- ^ section to itself. The compliance with set forms of the 
State religion exacted from the imperial -troops admits ob- 
viously a different interpretation to that assigned to it in 
this work. With these, no doubt important, exceptions, the 
category of charges brought to affix on Julian the name of 
persecutor is complete ; for we cannot seriously notice tales of 
■the inspection of human livers, more particularly of ungrown 
boys and girls, sacrificed for the purposed Nor again shall 
we give credence to Theodoret's statement that the Emperor, 
having summoned Publia into the streets of Antioch, ordered 
one of his body-guard to box her ears and scratch her cheeks ^: 
or his still wilder figments that, after the Emperor's death, 
chests filled with heads were found at Antioch, and in a 

1 The story is drawn from Sulpic. Severus' Life of S. Martin. It is very 
likely fictitious in all details. The scene is localised at Worms {apud Vangi- 
onum civitatem, c. iv), and it seems impossible to fit in the narrative of the 
impending engagement with any surviving account of Julian's campaigns. 
The argument in the text remains sound, if inapplicable to this particular 
instance. 

^ Sok. III. xiii. 11 accepted and quoted by Nikeph. x. 24. The traditional 
sites of these atrocities, Alexandria and Athens, would exculpate Julian 
personalty. 

^ Theod. III. xix. 5. It is possible of course that in resisting the soldiers 
she received some slight external injury. 



PERSECUTION. 201 

■temple at Carrhse, last visited by tlie Emperor and sealed till 
his return, the corpse of a woman suspended by the hair and 
ripped up to expose the fatidical reading of her liver\ Some 
vague ^ charges have been left unrehearsed, besides those 
considered in the account of Julian's legislation. Theodoret^ 
for instance, says that all Christians were expelled from the 
army, while others modify the statement to expulsion from 
the household troops, the most privileged branch that is of 
the service*. The history of the Persian campaign renders 
both charges demonstrably untrue. That to secure funds for 
the Persian campaign fines were levied on all who refused to 
s,acrifice is highly improbable^, though we can readily be- 
lieve^ that Pagan tax-collectors did not abate their legal 
claims in assessing Christian contributors. Sozomen'' in- 
forms us that Julian replied to the ambassadors of be- 
leaguered Nisibis, that if they wanted help they must first 
revert to Paganism : but answering this unproved imputa- 
tion stands the solid fact that in his Persian campaign Julian 
did' despatch aid to Nisibis. 

With the above reservations no single . allegation of real Conclu- 
weight^ has been consciously omitted or underrated. The col- ^'^°^^^' 
lection of so many scattered charges into a single focus neces- 
sarily tends to intensify their real magnitude^ But on judicial 
survey of the whole evidence in array it is just to conclude — 

^ Greg. Naz. 07\ it. 92 hints at similar atrocities, but -without attempting 
to specify or substantiate his charges. Kedrenus i. p. 525, and also Glykas 
rv. p. 472, improve on these tales at pleasure. 

2 Greg. Naz. Or. xxv. ix. p. 461, Philost. E. H. vii. i. 

3 Theod. III. viii., supported by Chrys. In luv. et Maxim. Mart. p. 573, 
§ 1, loan. Antioch. Frag. 179. 

* Sok. III. xiii. 1 (of. III. sxii. 2). Julian probably to some extent pm'ged 
the troops about his person of Christians. Motives of personal security 
would prompt the step. 

2 The charge appears in Sok. iii. xiii. 9, xvii. 1, Nikeph. s. 24, Theoph. 
I. p. 81. 

6 Sok. in. xiii. 9. '' Soz. v. 3. 

8 I cannot retail quite all the gossip of later centuries. For instance 
though Theoph. i. p. 74 murders Bp. Dorotheus of Tyre at 107 years of 
age, I allow him to die a natural death. 

9 Justice plainly demands some deduction from the representations of 
the various Church historians. For, apart from all conscious insincerity, 



202 JULIAN. 

1. That no organised or widespread persecution prevailed 
during Julian's reign. 

2. That the sporadic instances which occurred were in 
almost every case provoked, and in part excused, by aggres- 
sive acts of Christians. 

3. That, while culpably condoning some Pagan excesses, 
the Emperor steadily set his face against persecution \ 

4. That he never authorised any execution on the ground 
of religion; that, where his conduct amounted to persecution, 
he did not abjure but set a strained interpretation on the 
laws of toleration which he professed. 



Note. 

On the torturing of Theodore, &c. 

Independently of conflicting accounts of the whole matter, a cnrious 
question of identity arises. Not only Julian was implicated in these 
events, but also his uncle and namesake, who was resident at the time 
in Antioch as Comes Orientis. If Julian gave the order for closing the 
Church of Antioch, to his uncle alone is imputed desecration of the 
holy vessels, defilement of the sanctuary, and brutality to the presbyter 
in charge, condvict censured by Julian himself. Mis. 365 c. Theod. and 
Soz. expatiate on the revolting details of the malady with which Divine 
retribution compassed his death. It seems possible that he too was 
responsible for the torture of Theodorus (v. infr.). Eufinus, Sokrates, 
Sozomen and Theodoret agree in representing Theodorus as arrested for 
his share in the Babylas demonstration, and the Emperor as authorising 
the arrest, which was executed against his own judgment by Salustius 

they wi'ote fit a time when the persecutions they record had hecome matter 
of liistory or hearsay, not of autoptic testimony, and were envhoued and 
magnified by the glamour of fading Paganism ; they were credulous and 
uncritical in sifting evidence ; they accepted as literal truth the declamation 
of Gregory of Naziauzus, from whom they largely quote ; and they com- 
menced with strong bias against the Apostate. On the other hand, to regai'd 
with Miicke the silence of Eufinus (or Ammianus Marcellinus) as disproof of 
the charges of Sokrates and Sozomen is to give up writing history. (Miicke 
p. 333.) 

^ There is no place where Julian more plainly insists on abstinence from 
persecution and ^^iolence, than that very letter to the people of Bostra, which 
has been quoted already as a signal instance of Julian's meanness. 



/ EDUCATION. 203 

the prsetorian prefect. According to Theod., only Salustius' repre- 
sentations prevented additional arrests and violence. Torture was 
inflicted by Salustius. The order for release came from the Emperor. 
Both Theod. iii. xi. 4 and Soz. v. xx. 5 make these events prior to the 
burning of the temple. I have ventured to adopt a slightly different 
sequence of events. 

There seems reason for thinking that it was really in connexion with 
the fire that Theodoras was put to torture. For (1) Amm. M. xxii. 
xiii. 1 (and so Theod. and Philost.) connects the Babylas demonstration 
very closely with the fire. ' At the same time,'' he writes, ' on the twenty- 
second day of October there was a sudden conflagration, &c. ;' (2) on that 
occasion torture was employed to discover the truth ; (3) the custodians 
of the temple and others (A. M. xxii. xiii. 2, Theod. iii. xi. 5) were put 
to the torture by Julian, the uncle of the Emperor (Theod. iii. xi. 5) : 
while the only presbyter mentioned (Soz. v. viii.) as maltreated by the 
said Julian, was named Theodoritus, or by another reading Theodoras : 
this certainly suggests confused identity. In Ruinart, Theodoritus is 
credited with a separate Passio, professing to come from the hand of 
one who lived in the jjalace at Antioch, and took part in the Persian 
campaign. Of the three (anonymous) MSS. from which it is derived 
I know nothing, but Mabillon, the earliest compiler, seems half to 
suspect them; the Acta Martyrum are not highly trustworthy docu- 
ments : in this particvdar Passio various confusions of dates and persons 
occur : the whole reads like an insipid compilation from the notices of 
the historians, uiterspersed with appropriate conversations and portents. 
To Julian personally, though at the expense of his imcle, the Passio is 
favourable. 



Section II. 
Educational Policy. 

Libanius. This princely youth is dangerous to the cause of knowledge. 
Basilius. Prince Julian is dangerous to many things. 

Ccesar the Apostate, Act ii. Henkik Ibsen (trans, by C. Eay). 

But of all Julian's proceedings levelled directly or indi- Roman 
rectly against Christianity, none is more noteworthy than his ^'^"^^- 
educational policy. Paganism and the old culture were to 
Julian's mind inseparably bound up together. The venerable 



20^! JULIAN. 

mother who had produced so choice an offspring must now 
lean on her child as her chief support. It was through the 
sophists and in the schools, not less than by the priests and 
in the shrines, that the great polytheistic revival was to be 
achieved. The conversion of one sophist was in Julian's eyes 
worth that of a hundred unlearned folk. Nor in so thinking 
did he exaggerate the truth. (Tlie power of the sophists must 
have been almost incalculable; the whole higher education 
of the Roman Empire was in their hands; the moral charge 
and training" of students no less than the intellectual was 
their province. Every great city, nay every country town^ 
had its schools or school. At the head of the school was the 
sophist who frequently held the position of state official, 
apf)ointed sometimes by the crown direct, sometimes by the 
municipality, sometimes by informal pMbiscite among the 
citizens themselves. In the large towns teachers could set 
up on their own account, but it needed unusual brilliance^ to 
compete successfully with the prestige and assured emolu- 
ment of a Reo^ius Professor. The curriculum of teaching was 
strictly 'classical'; the main staple of education being rhe- 
toric and philosophy. Homer and Yirgil, Demosthenes and 
Cicero, Plato and Aristotle were then as now the models 
proposed for imitation^. Thus the text-books of education 
were entirely Pagan: the object of the schools was secular 
not religious: they aimed at training young gentlemen to 
exact thought and facile expression, combined with some intel- 
ligent knowledge of law and history. When that was achieved, 
their work was done. No 'religious difficulty' had as yet 
been raised to complicate educational arrangements: the 
moral and doctrinal training of its members was left to the 
discretion of the church to which they belonged. Yet to 
many Christians educational work had seemed an honourable 

1 Libanius at Constantinople successfully emptying the class-room of 
Nikokles is one notorious instance. 

2 Cf. Capes' University Life in Ancient Athens, 81 pp. At Athens atten- 
tion was confined to Greek only, to the contempt of Latin {ibid. p. 82), 
but in the Western Empire, especially the schools of Gaul, this was not the 
case. 



EDUCATION. 205 

calling. It was no more distinctively Christian than the bar 
or the army, but certainly it was not less so : men of so lofty 
and uncompromising a type of Christianity as Basil of Csesa- 
rea and Gregory of Nazianzus were 'among the chief orna- 
ments of the profession \. When Basil was appointed to the 
chair of rhetoric at Ceesarea, the great Libanius himself had 
written congratulating the Cappadocians on having such a 
master and himself such a colleague. ) ^-- 1 

Julian shrewdly perceived that here was a most powerful Julian and 
engine ready to his hand. Each school might become an flg,,^^-^' 
active centre of Pagan propagandism. Paganism should no 
longer fall a victim to arrows winged from her own feathers ^ 
In an evil hour for his own reputation he conceived a belief, 
that by cutting off Christians from the higher culture of the 
day, he might effectually if gradually checkmate Christianity. 
Apparently it was in his power to do so, provided that th6 
Christians made no forcible resistance. It would be difficult 
to name a law prohibiting Christian professors' from keeping 
open schools upon their own account; but both from the 
terms of Julian's edicts and from the resignation of their 
chairs by Christian occupants, the inference seems clear that 
it was at the Emperor's discretion that each professor held his 
seat, or might keep open lecture-rooms. His first educational First 
edicts issued May 12, 362 a.d., merely confirmed the existing ^'^*''*" 
privileges of all doctors of medicine and professors, and their 
immunity from public burdens. So far the new Emperor's 
educational polioy was conservative. Shortly however it 
shewed a reforming tendency of the paternal government 
type. The new edict, five weeks* later in date, runs thus: — 

" Seeing that it is expedient that all masters and teachers be Second 
patterns not less of morality than of eloquence, and seeing that I Edict. 
cannot be present in person in each individual township, be it 
enacted that whoever desires the work of a teacher, do not intrude 
into the office suddenly or rashly, but that after orderly examina- 
tion held his appointment be sanctioned by decree of the curiales, 

1 In Sozomen's language v. xviii., they ' cast all others into the shade.' 

2 Theod. III. 8, 9. 

3 Theod. Cod. xiii. iii. 4. 

* Issued June 17, shortly before his arrival at Antioch. Theod. Cod. 
XIII. iii. 5, 



206 JULIAN. 

with consent and confirmation of the nptim.i. Such decree shall 
be transautted to me for endorsement, that under our sanction 
teachers may with more exalted honour conduct the studies of the 
townships." 

Its effect. Due allowance being made for tlae bureaucratic system of 

the Empire, for the personal prerogative of the Emperor, and 
for Julian's own activity of supervision in all departments of 
state, the enactment is unobjectionable. At the same time 
the preliminary clause concerning morals (mores) might 
arouse suspicion. For religion was at least an admissible 
interpretation of the word, and thus the preamble might 
cover and portend an assault upon Christian teachers in the 
Schools. However as the election of professors was left in 
the hands of the municipal authorities, subject only to the 
Imperial veto, the Christians might still hope, where in a 
majority upon the Council, to secure such teachers as they 
desired. Doubtless court influences would be strong, but 
Christian unanimity might counteract them; for the present 
at any rate, there was no open grievance on which to ground 
an agitation. The decree proved far less, or less speedily, 
effectual than Julian hoped. It was too timid and tentative 
to do much. It was quite clear that no conciliar resolution 
would dismiss the aged Marius Yictorinus, on whose ]ips for 
more than forty years the youth of Rome had hung: yet no 
Christian sophist was of greater mark. It must have been 
the talk of every drawing-room, as well as the joy of every 
Christian, when the venerable professor, in the white robe of 
the catechumen, made in open church the baptismal profes- 
sion and was marked with the Sacramental sign of allegiance 
to Christ \ The edict indeed contains no provision for dis- 
missal Christians in possession remained untouched. Even 
if they did not outlive the law itself, their disappearance 
would be provokingly slow. It might be difficult too, if not 
engender serious troubles, for the imperial veto continually 
to exercise itself on Christian nominations. It would be 
better, so at least it seemed to Julian, to show his hand,, 
trusting to the weakness of the adversary for victory. Julian 

1 Augustine narrates the story in his Confessions, viii. ii. and v. 



EDUCATION. 207 

possessed that impatient, restless, nervous temperament which 
can never be content to play the waiting game. Hardly any 
trait in his character is more naarked. In war, in religion, in 
the conduct of public business it is always there: it betrayed 
itself in the glance of his eye, nay in his very gait. He had 
none of that calm, still reliance, that serene intrepidity, that 
imperturbable nonchalance, that characterised no one more 
vividly than his great contemporary Athanasius. Julian could 
never stand long on the defensive, or fight from behind lines: 
better, if need were, to burn his ships and at all risks go for- 
ward. Accordingly the following remarkable rescript^ shortly 
appeared, on this occasion radical enough in tone : — 

"Riglit education^ we take to consist not in outward polish of 
phrase and expression, but in a sound disposition of intelligent 
thought and in just notions touching virtue and vice, honour and 
shame. Whoever thinks one thing, but teaches his scholars another, 
falls sliort from an educational, no less than from a moral point 
of view. If the difference between the mind and the tongue 
of the teacher extended only to trifles, his dishonesty, though 
objectionable, might yet be tolerated. But where the subject is 
all-important and the teacher instils the exact contrary of his 
own convictions, it becomes nothing less than intellectual huck- 

^ Ep. 42. It is matter for regret that the date of this rescript is uncertain. 
De Broglie, iv. 210, in his rather rhetorical manner speaks of it being posted . 
upon the walls of Constantinople, and hesitatingly assigns it a date very 
shortly succeeding that of the May (sic) edict. Alike in charity and judg- 
ment I assign it (with M. Desjardins) to Julian's later Antioch legisla- 
tion. For, first, the June edict (De Broglie errs in saying May) falls out- 
side the close of Julian's residence at Constantinople ; he left Constanti- 
nople in May ; at the end of July he was akeady legislating at Antioch. 
Secondly, notwithstanding De Broglie's argument from the natural correla- 
tion of the two, surely some interval is required, if only to suggest the 
afterthought or to give trial to the previous experiment, between the June 
edict and this. Thirdly, its contents relegate, it to the latter part of Julian's 
reign when he was growing embittered against Christianity. Fourthly, 
Amm. Marc, whose arrangement is throughout chronological, does not 
allude to it till after Julian's arrival at Antiocli. One indirect piece of 
chronological evidence supports this view. EunajDius (born 347) went to 
Athens we know at the age of sixteen, that is in the year 363, with the 
intention of studying under Proffiresius. On his arrival ProEeresius had 
but just been suspended from his functions as professor. This seems to 
point conclusively to 363, or the very end of 362 as the date of the edict. 

2 I find one more version of this notorious edict appended to G. A, 
Denison's Notes of my Life. 



208 JULL\Jf. 

storing, the immoral and shameful trade of men who teach most 
energetically what they contemn most comi)letely, to cajole and 
inveigle by sham commendations those to whom they wi«h to 
dispose of their own — I can giv3 it no better name — bad stuff. 

'AH would-be educatoi's must be moral, and must sincerely 
hold opinions not antagonistic to current beliefs ; more espe- 
cially those who are engaged in the education of the young, as 
expounders of the old classical authors, whether as rlietoricians, 
or grammarians, or, above all, as sophists. For sophists, apart 
from other claims, affect to be teachers of morals as well as 
language, and claim social philosophy as their proper province. 
How far this is true or untrue \ve need not stay to inquire. But 
in commending the lofty aim of their professions, I coiild com- 
mend them more highly if they spoke the truth, and did not 
stand self-convicted of believing one thing and teaching their 
hearers another. And in this Avay : — Homer, Hesiod, Demosthenes, 
Herodotus, Thukydides, Isokrates, Lysias, found in the Gods the 
source of all learning. Some esteemed themselves priests of 
Hermes, others of the Muses, I hold it absurd and improper 
for those who undertake to expound these authors to dishonour 
the Gods whom they honoured. I do not say — it would be 
absurd to do so — that they are bound to reform their opinions and 
remain instructors of the young. I leave them the option of not 
teaching what they consider vicious, or else, if anxious to continue 
teaching, of primaiily and bond fide impressing upon their scholars 
that neither Homer nor Hesiod nor any other author, -whom in 
their teaching they have charged with irreligion and theological 
folly and error, is such as they have represented. Otherwise in 
' drawing the fees for their support from the works of such authors 
they own to a mean sordidness, that for the sake of a few pence 
vs^ill go all lengths. 

'Hitherto there have been many reasons for not attending at 
temple worship : the prevailing terrorism furnished some excuse 
for disguising the truest religious convictions. But now that the 
Gods have granted us liberty, it is monstrous for men any longer 
to teach what they do not believe sound. If they acknowledge 
the wisdom of those whose writings they interpret, and whose 
prophets as it were they are, let them first of all imitate their 
piety towards the Gods. ■ But if they feel that they have gone 
astray concerning the Gods, the most adorable, then let them go 
to the churches of the Galilseans to expound Matthew and Luke, 
in obedience to whom ye are bidden to abstain from holy rites. 
And may your ears', as ye would say, and your tongue be born 
again to those doctrines, to which I pray that I and all that love 
me in thought or deed may ever cleave. 

'To guides and instructors of youth this is the law that I 

^ Julian uses scoffingly the Hellenistic or Hebraistic ctKoas. The ws cii' 
i//x€t J eifiroixe clearly cannot be levelled at the i^ava-yewridrivau 



EDUCATION. 209 

ordain for all. None that desire to attend lectures are debarred. 
For it is as unreasonable to debar from the right path children 
ignorant as yet whither they should turn, as to drive them by 
fear and by force to the religion of their fathers. Indeed it would 
be right to treat them like imbeciles aud heal them against their 
will, only that allowance has to be made for all afflicted with this 
kiad of malady. Fools are better taught than punished.' 

The form in which this remarkable production has been The Ee- 
preserved deserves notice. It is numbered among the letters. IZised^^' 
It finds no place, even in an abbreviated form, in the Theo- 
dosian Code. In other words it is a Greek rescript, in some 
sort of private or special application \ not an Imperial law 
promulgated in Latin, and circulated throughout the realm. J. 
To pass from the form to the matter; the preamble, having 
indulged in some very proper philosophic moralising on the 
function of the teacher, next assumes that all sound educa- 
tion must take for its basis the old classical authors. The 
preliminary fencing testifies to some sense of constraint in 
the writer, to an awkward misgiving with regard to the next 
step in the argument. However the plunge is made. By a as illogi- 
reckless leap it is asserted, with the complacent pretentious- ^^ ' 
ness of an axiom, that it is absurd, that it is improper, to 
teach the classics yet reject their theological beliefs. To make 
money by such a course is the depth of meanness and dupli- 
city. The ensuing flourish about toleration and liberty of 
belief forms an odd preface to the undignified taunts that 
follow. Argument degenerates into sneers, and they to pro- 
fanity, till the document gracelessly concludes .with conces- 
sions couched in the form of insults. Altogether the perform- 
ance is as little creditable a one as Julian ever penned. It 
is as clear as manner can make it that Julian was at heart 
dissatisfied at the part he was playing, even if he afterwards 
flattered or argued himself into self-approval. Persecuting 

1 The documents with which in form it is to be compared are the de- 
spatches to the Alexandrians [Epp. 10. 26. 51. 58), to the Jews (Ep. 25), 
to the Bostrenians [Ep. 52), or to public functionaries (e.g. Epp. 6. 9. 50. 56). 
To treat it (cf . Eode 64) as Julian's interpretation of his June decree, for the 
benefit of some pai'ticular officer or township, does not appear to me justi- 
fiable. Schrockh assumes a second edict corresponding ioEp. 42, and to 
the statements of Christian historians. 

E. E. 14 



210 JULIAN. 

enactments of this kind are never bettered by shallow at- 
tempts at self-justification: which merely go to prove the 
conscious weakness and embarrassment of the author. Julian's 
brief was really hopeless, whatever special pleading he might 
adopt. To impute hypocrisy to Christian teachers was ridi- 
culous. The real grievance against them was that they 
discredited the classics. Whatever admiration they expressed 
for their eloquence or their poetry, they never for one instant 
canonised their creed. In their eyes the futility of their 
religious teaching hardly merited exposure. Thus Julian, 
has to invest them with his own beliefs (which they loudly 
disavowed) by way of peg for the imputation to hang upon. 
From an earnest if narrow Christian point of view much 
might have been said, as to the propriety of making these 
heathen authors the staple of education. Much might have 
been urged, as Tertullian had urged, as to the demoralising 
tendency of the obscenities and vulgarities with which they 
abound; much too, in the days when Paganism was still a 
living power, against the unsettling influence of the poly- 
theistic teaching\ And among contemporary Christians there 
were not wanting warm advocates of such views. But this 
whole field of argument was cut off from Julian. He could 
not in consistency say one word against the fables of Homer 
or the morals of Hesiod. Nay, with one breath he asserted 
that these were the sole possible staple of a sound education 
whether moral or intellectual, and with the next forbade any 
Christian man to teach them, and by the same token, as he 
knew well, any Christian boy to learn them. Out of an as- 
sumed regard for Christian consciences he would decline to 
suffer that which their conscience did not disapprove. His 
objections may have been honest, but he was not in a proper 
position to object. Because Scripture on Julians showing 
forbade all access to the classics, therefore Christians were 
denied that classical training which their own interpretation 
of Scripture allowed. Julian, in the same sentence, enforces 
and ridicules the authority of the Bible. To such shifts had 
prejudice reduced the philosopher. And for the matter of 

1 Sok. III. 16. 



EDUCATION. 211 

conscience, who was Julian that he should be an arbiter 
among the people? What were his claims to sit in judgment 
on the Church, to pass a verdict on the liabilities of Chris- 
tians? Christianity had dared long since to lay under con- 
tribution the treasures of the wisdom of the ancients, and in 
the name of Christ claimed philosophy and science, in joint 
possession with the heathen. As its hand passed along the 
chords it could evoke, says Gregory', new music of its own, 
and attune those grand old melodies to unison with the 
Gospel theme, which ruled the whole. Since the time of 
Origen and Clement at any rate no Index Expurgatorius laid 
its ban upon the myths of Pindar or the theology of ^schy- 
lus: no Apage Satanas closed the Phsedrus or the Ethics 
against the Christian student. The leaders of Christian 
thought had lacked the nice discernment, the wise vigilance, 
the scrupulous consistency, that would have shunned the 
polluting touch of unclean philosophies. They had not 
that Mohammedan zeal, which believed that all literature 
beyond the Bible was useless from its identity or baneful 
from its superfluity. They had not even the Pagan fer- 
vour, the counterpart of Julian's own, to desire the annihila- Ep.9. 
tion of all that heathen polytheistic lore. So in the 
latter days an Apostate Christian forsooth must arise and ct/r. 229 c 
expound to them what it was fitting for a Christian to teach 
and what not. 

In this edict further lurks the fatal flaw that necessarily as ineffec- 
mars every edict of persecution. The blow would prostrate ' 
the honest conscious Christian, while the dishonest need but J 

bow his head and he would remain unscathed. Though in 
this particular instance, where the aim was so unworthy, 
this might have proved a not undesired result, A percentage 
of false disloyal Christians might be no ill leaven among the 
teachers, whom it behoved to be a pattern of morals as well 
as learning. And once again it defeated its o"wn ends in 
depriving Christian lads of the sole cure of their infatuation 
that Julian could offer. The merest tyro in politics could 
foresee that Christian parents would not send their sons to 

1 Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 106, p. 135. 

. 14—2 



212 JULIAN. 

'denominationar schools, which were the confessed organs of 
Pagan proselytism; while that Julian was not in a position to 
enact a statute for compulsory state education', the insulting 
regret which closes liis rescript frankly enough declares. 
as short- Finally, the edict was unwise in its own interests. The law 
siy I ei . j.^^ ^^.^^^ .^^ author. But had its provisions endured and 
proved effective, it needs small wit to discern the result. 
The Church has never been backward in devising and exe- 
* cuting schemes of education, the value of which she from the 
earliest days so fearlessly recognised. A displacement of all 
Christian teachers from State Schools would have been the 
sig-nal for the rise of unnumbered Church Schools, which 
would soon have disarmed Paganism of its most effective 
weapon of offence. Even as it was efforts in this direction, 
though not of the wisest kind, were quickly made. The two 
Apollinares^ devised a wholly new curriculum: the father not 
only composed a Christian Grammar, but turned the Penta- 
teuch into twenty-four books of heroic verse, and selections 
from the historical books into tragedies, while the son reduced 
both Gospels and Epistles to the form of Platonic dialogues. 
The Edict Such was the edict which for his hero's sake Ammianus^ 
says must be ' plunged into everlasting silence,' as the darkest 
blot left upon the reign of Justice that he tried to renovate 
on earth: and which more than one Christian writer settles 
upon as before all else entitling him to the name of perse- 
cutor. There is no one act, where his personal responsibility 
is clearly established, which does so more justly. 
Practical It is easier however to criticise the words and character 
^Edlet. of ttie decree than to estimate its exact practical effect. The 
June edict* certainly applies on the face of it to schools 
throughout all the municipal towns of the Empire. The 
rescript under discussion proclaims itself a general law for 

1 From a passage in Misop. 356 it seems that at Antioch at any rate 
Julian made futile efforts hi this direction, to which the Christians, and not 
least the Christian women, made a determined opposition. 

- Sok. III. 16, Soz. V. 18, combined at length by Nikeph. x. 25 sqq. 

3 lUud iuclemens, obrueudum perenui silentio. Amm. M. xxii. x. 7. 

* 8upr. p. 205. 



perseciit 
ing. 



EDUCATION. 213 

all instructors and teachers' : as such it is treated by the 
Christian writers who animadvert upon it. Gregory of Na- 
zianzus, a well-informed if partisan witness, writes thus : 
' He ousted us from letters (Koycov) like so many pilferers, . . . 
fearing the confutation of heathen errors'; and adheres to 
the same language, when he speaks of the Christians being 
deprived, defrauded, or debarred from school learning^ 
Eufinus^ testifies that Christians were forbidden to study 
Pagan authors, admission to the schools being confined to 
worshippers of the Gods and Goddesses. Sokrates^ describes 
the law as one 'prohibiting the Christians from education'; 
Sozomen^ states that Julian forbade the children of Chris- 
tians to study the Greek poets and orators, or to attend 
Pagan schools : and Theodoret® invests the prohibition with 
a similar latitude. Ammian's'' censure of the decree cer- 
tainly implies no less gross a violation of the liberty of the 
subject, and in another passage^ he states in the broadest 
way that public abjuration of their faith by Christian teach- 
ers and rhetoricians was indispensable to their continuance 
in office. 

Were not the evidence so full, and on the whole so Its real 
harmonious, it might plausibly be argued that Julian's legis- '*""*•''• 
lation was applicable only to a definite class of State Pro- 
fessors. In favour of this might be urged, the peculiar form 
of the rescript itself; the difficulty of supposing that there 
was in existence any such complete and centralised system 
of Imperial education, as would admit of effective super- 
vision and control by the Head of the State ; lastly, the in- 
controvertible fact that the Christian subjects did at once 
design, if not institute, some form of voluntary schools, in 

^ Toh Kadriye/jLoai Kal didacrKoKois Kotvbs /cetrat vofios, Ep. 42. 

^ T(2v Xoywu T]jj.ds d-rrrjXaffev, Greg. Naz. Oi\ iv. 5, p. 79. Cf. rb Xoyuv 
aTrocrepijcrai Xptcmavoijs, Or. lY. 101, p. 132, with ensuing chapters, and so 
Tuv \6yo3v diroKXeiaOipTes, Or. v. 39, p. 174. 

3 Euf. I. 82. 

* 'KpiffTiavoiis TratSeiJcrews fJ-7] yuere'xeti', Sok. ill. 12; toiis ^pio-riavoiis 'EXXtj- 
viKTJs irai8elas fMerixeiv e/cwXue, ib. III. 16. 

5 Soz. V. 18. 

6 Theod. in. 8, cf. too Nikeph. x. 25, 26, pp. 54—60. 

7 Amna. M. xxii. x. 7. s Hjjjj, ^xv. iv. 20. 



214 JULIAN. 

which works similar to those of the ApoUinares would form 

a part of the curriculum. 

Possible Had Julian limited his measure to that recognised class 

eMenua- ^f Professors, who obtained their chairs and derived their 

lion of the 

edict. emoluments direct from the state, that is to say from the 

imperial treasury, and not. from the contributions of local 
tax-payers, his policy would deserve a milder censure. By 
such action he would merely have asserted a principle, which 
was later destined to obtain unquestioned acceptance : 
namely, that no heretical, still less atheistical, teaching could 
be authorised or supported by the state. To a sincere 
Pagan, whose hands ruled the machinery of state education 
with autocratic power, it might well seem legitimate to turn 
it to the end which he thought best\ It appeared unrea- 
sonable for the state to subsidise teachers for inculcating 
that the state Gods were devils, or for the Pagan parent to 
contribute towards the training of his son as a Pheidippides, 
to whom in old age he might play Strepsiades. What would 
make the particular application of the principle culpably 
gross in Julian's case is, first, that in his age, as necessarily 
under every extended polytheistic dispensation, religion, or 
at any rate the choice of a religion, was far more an open 
question than in medieval or even modern times; secondly, 
that it was a very large section, in many places an enormous 
majority of his subjects, in the teeth of whose convictions 
he legislated ; and thirdly, that it was an entire innovation 
to make education at all a vehicle for religious proselytism. 
The Edict Still had Julian stopped here, he would have deserved 
genuine j^^ore tender condemnation. But a candid review of the lan- 

Ijersecu- 

tion. guage of the actual edict, of the testimonies of historians, 

. and of the practical action taken by the ApoUinares and 
other educational leaders, appears to supply demonstrative 
proof that Julian deliberately" resolved not merely to purge 
the imperial Professorial chairs of unorthodox occupants, not 
merely to impose a conformity test on all teachers in the 
public municipal schools, but penally to prohibit Christians 
from teaching or publicly reading the master-pieces of Pagan 
1 UUmann, Greg, von Naz. 85 pp. defends Julian's action. 



EDUCATION. 21s; 

literature, and thereby to cramp if possible and lastingly im- 
pair the training and intellect of Christian children. The 
act was one of genuine, if refined, persecution. Nothing 
could justify such a prohibition short of proof that the effects 
of Christian teaching were openly and scandalously immoral. 
If Julian at times hints, he never seriously offers to substan- 
tiate so untenable a charge. Prejudice in this instance 
betrayed him into sophistries, culminating in a form of per- 
secution quite as unjustifiable as those coarser methods 
which in word and act he constantly repudiated. 

How far the edict was executed, materials for forming an Actual 
opinion are few. To judge from the outcry it caused among ^j^-^f*" 
the Christians and the prominence accorded to it even in 
anti-Christian writers, it remained by no means a dead 
letter. Nor were its provisions evaded, as they might have 
been, by cowardly reticence. Doubtless not a few Christian 
professors, trimmers such as Hekebolius, must have preferred 
apostasy to ruin. The clause in Julian's edict which spoke 
of the removal of terrorism, and the free avowal of religious 
beliefs must have rung mockingly enough in their ears. But 
in the main the Christians seem to have met the challenge 
nobly: by general consent they chose to surrender their pro- 
fession rather than their faith ^: one or two conspicuous ex- 
amples emerge from the number of unrecorded witnesses. At 
Rome Marius Victorinus could not forswear the God who had 
given his tongue its eloquence : at Laodicea the Apollinares, 
father and son, commenced their classical reconstructions of 
Scriptures : Musonius^ proved staunch : Proa^resius^ first of 
the Athenian Professoriate, the former tutor of Julian, re- 
ceived from his ex-pupil an assurance that in his case the 
authorities would not enforce the decree, no doubt with some 
implied hope of reciprocal forbearance on his part. In a like 
spirit Constantius had offered money to Liberius to support 
him in the exile he had himself inflicted. Proseresius, like 
Liberius, rejected not without disdain the proffered gratuity. 

1 Or. VII. 30. 

2 Vita luliani app. to Mamertinus' Panegyric in Migne, Patrol. Lat. 
vol. 18. 

^ Eunap. Vit. Soph. Proaeresii, Jer. Euseh. Ghron. 



21G JULIAN. 

Fame has recorded the doings of these Coryphaei of the 
Church : of many another true man, who faced temporal loss 
as nobly, no record is inscribed upon the tablets of history. 



Section III. 

Estimates of Julian. 

The evidence of facts that have affixed the name of per- 
secutor on Julian has now been so far as possible sifted. The 
upshot of the whole is, in a word, that Julian 'persecuted 
Christianity rather than the Christians V and to the best of 
his strength, though with sporadic failures here and there, 
impressed a like policy upon the empire at large. His 
tolerance to the individual was, as his treatment of the 
system declares, in the main not a moral sentiment rooted 
in large-hearted equity, but a calculated system of policy. 
It will now be instructive to cite the more important testi- 
monies that bear upon the point, and see how far they cor- 
roborate the conclusions drawn from the facts. For this 
Julian's purpose Julian's own works must be assigned the fullest 
wri mgs. y^Q[g]^i^ ^md consisting as in no small part they do of informal 
instructions to subordinates and of letters to personal friends, 
it is impossible to suppose that they contain only hypo- 
critical representations of his true sentiments. In public 
documents such as the Epistle to the Athenians, a politic 
mask of toleration might be assumed ; and no decisive stress 
could be laid on them. On the other hand despatches to 
offending towns or individuals are absolutely reliable evidence 
of Julian's public policy, and confidential letters to ministers 
and private friends no less so of his real intentions. In case 
of all historical characters the survival of their correspondence 
is the surest touchstone of their worth ; Julian can happily 
be subjected to the ordeal, and issues from it, if not scathe- 
less, yet cleared of the most damaging charges. Throughout 

^ Cf. Wiggers in Zeitsch.filr die Hist. Tlieol. 1837. By this rather thin 
epigram, which is the text of his discourse, he means that JuUan strove 
rather to dethrone the system than to do personal violence to the individual. 



PERSECUTION. 217 

his letters there is on the whole nothing so blackening to 
his fame as the education rescript, which has just been so 
fully discussed. The general principles he avows are usually 
most irreproachable. He makes frequent appeal to the 
clemency of his enactments. 

'So kindly and tenderly/ he writes to Hekebolius', 'have I 
dealt with all the Galileans, that I have suifered no man any- 
where to be violently dragged to the temples or put to any other 
svich despite against his own free choice.' 

Again, in one of his most spiteful letters, writing to a 
city conspicuous for the turbulence engendered by religious 
factions, and writing too from Antioch when the year 862 
was more than half spent, while forbidding riots and clerical 
mob- demonstrations, he expressly confirms to the Christians 
of Bostra their unrestricted right of assembling together, 
and practising all such devotions as they pleased. After 
rebuking sectarian animosities and reprisals, and calling on 
Pagan worshippers not to injure or plunder the houses of 
those who are led astray by ignorance rather than choice, he 
declares^ that men should be convinced and instructed by. 
reason, not by blows or assaults or bodily violence, and closes 
thus : 

'Again and again I charge all votaries of the true woi-ship to Ep. 52. 438 b 
do no wrong to the Galilean masses, neither to raise hand nor 
direct insult against them. For those who go wrong in matters 
of the highest import deserve pity, not hatred, for religion is 
verily chiefest of goods, and ir religion the worst of evils,' ' 

Without qualification or misgiving he contrasts his own Ep. S2. 436 a 
treatment of Christians with that of his Christian prede- 
cessor, and recites the sufferings of the heretics of Samosata 
and Kyzikus, and the depopulation of the fairest provinces of 
Asia, to make his own leniency stand in clearer light against 
that background of shadows : and in the Misopogon, the 
latest perhaps of all his works, written at Antioch in 363, 
he challenges the citizens to adduce against him a single 

1 Not the Sophist (who was amongst Julian's correspondents, cf, Ep. 19), 
but the Governor of Edessa. 

^ Exactly similar sentiments are attributed to him. Liban. Epitaph. 
p. 562. On this topic, cf. Beugnot, 187 pp. 



218 JULIAN. 

instance of religious persecution. One short letter^ states 

his view so very frankly and succinctly, that it shall be 

rendered entire. 

* /,' he begins empbatically, ' / by the Gods want no GaUleans 
killed, or wrongfully scourged, or otherwise injured. Godly* men 
I do desire to be encouraged, and plainly say they ought. This 
Galilean folly has turned almost everything upside down : nothing 
but the Gods' mercy has saved us all. Therefore we ought to 
liouour the Gods and godly men and cities.' 

It is perfectly true that there are passages in a different 
tone. In number they are comparatively few, and to each 
of them in their proper place, whether to domineering acri- 
moniousness towards Atbanasius, or to malicious spite against 
Titus of Bostra, or to acrid gibes upon the Christians of 
Edessa, attention has been fully and faithfully called in the 
foregoing pages. It remains true that, the education rescript 
excepted, throughout the surviving works of Julian there 
remains not one passage counselling or legalising persecu- 
tion, that on the contrary, m every case where his own tone 
is most bitter and might most seem to countenance, if not 
suggest, persecution, he is careful to say that neither theoreti- 
cally nor practically does he regard it as a suitable engine of 
conversion. Higher praise cannot with justice be given. 
Julian neither practised nor claimed to practise an impartial 
toleration. He went as far as abstract justice seemed to 
demand ; but not a step further. He recognised no call for 
generosity, no claim to a perfect equality of position for all 
creeds. In dealing with his Christian subjects, justice, a 
niggard justice, once satisfied, this is his tone — 

Ep. 49. 432 A No law requires that they my care should prove 

Or pity, hated by the Gods above ^. 

Christianity should exist on sufferance only. 

»•. 
1 Ep. 7, addressed to a certain Artabius otherwise unknown. 
^ deocre^e'is. Julian's 'godly men' (cf. OHver Cromwell's phrase) are of 
course ' Pagans.' This official note is, by La Bleterie and others, attributed 
to Juhan's earlier months. De Broglie (L'Eglise <fcc. iv. p. 277) is perhaps 
more correct in dating it from Antioch. 

3 ov yap fioi 64/ji.is iffrl Ko/M^ifxeu oi'5' iXeaipeiv 

dvipai, ol' Ke deotciv dxix^^vr' ddavdroLCTLV. 
The lines are quoted or rather perverted from Od. x. 73. 



PERSECUTION. 219 

In the works of the historians there is much to lead to Julian's 

similar results. It would be idle work to rehearse the con- ■^***°^'^'- 

ans. 

ventional praises of Pagans or the vague defamations of 
Christian writers. The admissions of both will be far more 
instructive. From the Pagan side there is little or no hint Pagan. 
of guilt of persecution, butAmmian^ does most emphatically, 
and not once only, except the education edict from his general 
verdict. Eutropius no doubt alludes to the same in his brief 
declaration that Julian persecuted the Christians, but re- 
frained from shedding their blood. Praises of leniency are 
of course plentiful in the mouth of Mamertinus or Himerius, 
Libanius or Eunapius. 

Turning to Church writers as more copious mines of in- Ecciesias- 
formation on this point, amid Gregory's unrivalled violence qj.J j^^z. 
of denunciation, passages of the following kind are to be 
found I 

'Authority lias two departments, persuasion and force ; the 
more brute element of despotism Julian delegated to the populace, 
whose recklessness goes all lengths of unreasoning inconsiderate 
impulse. He issued indeed no public ordinance; but non-repres- 
sion of excesses converted his wishes into unwritten law. The 
milder and more royal departinent, of persuasion, he made his own 
prerogative : yet did not adhere to it completely : for the leopard 
cannot change his spots, nor the Moor his skin, nor fire its burning, 
nor the Evil One, who is a murderer from the beginning, his 
malice, nor Julian his naughtiness.' 

The quotation has been carried so far to avoid giving a 
mere garbled extract, and to show also that it was not some 
sudden weak relenting that betrayed Gregory into admis- 
sions which he elsewhere seems to forget. In other places 
he is evidently at a loss for charges to drive quite securely 
home the charge of persecution in its narrower sense. Such 
surely are the two following passages : 

* Julian omitted no kind of impiety ; by persuasion, by threats, 
by sophistries he drew men to himself, not only by guile but also ' 

1 If controversy has not demonstrated joro and con that Ammian was a 
Pagan, at least no intelligent Christian reader can doubt it. 
- Greg. Naz. Or. vf. 61, p. 105. 



220 JULIAN. 

by force*. But by no sophistical disguises could he conceal his 
persecution.' 

Here the category of modes of persecution clearly needed 
some climax, which is certainly not supplied by the explana- 
tory afterthought. In the last words too there is conscious 
"weakness of accusation'. 

One passage more will suflfice^ : — 

*0f all persecutions ever made, Julian devised the most in- 
human : for lie mingled pei-suasion with tyranny, grudgiug his 
victims the glory of martyrdom, and casting doubt upon the zeal 
of the fearless.' 

This is a valuable comment on Gregory's poetical flights^ 
when, after mention of Cain and the Sodomites, of Pharaoh, 
Ahab, and Herod, he apostrophises Julian thus : — 

Mid all that swell the persecutors' hne, 

Early or late or in the after tune. 
Latest yet first, preemmeuce is thine, 

Slayer of souls, Satan's foul sink of crime, 
Tyrant acciu'sed! 

Buftnus. Rufinus, whose writing, though full of hostility to Julian, 

bears generally an impress of honesty and veracity, says* 
that Julian, 

' Craftier than all other persecutors, avoiding violence and toi'- 
tures, by rewards and distinctions and flattery and persuasions 
wrought upon moi-e part of the people than if he had made 
violent assault upon them. He forbade Christians to study 
Pagan authors, and admission to the schools was reserved for 
such only as worshipped the Gods and Goddesses.' 

Sokrates. With this declaration Sokrates is in marked accord. At- 

tention has been already directed to the distinction which he 
draws ^ between the outset of Julian's reign, when he ^ was 
' indulgent to all alike,' and the subsequent period when he 
'began to display partialities'; but the historian, while dwell- 

1 Greg. Naz. Or. xvin. 32, p. 353. J/3tafero is so far ambiguous that 
' by constraint ' would be as faithful a rendering as ' by force. ' 

2 Greg. Naz. Or. xxi. 32. 

3 Poem. Lib. i. § ii. p. 323. In Laud. Virg. 1. 454—458. 

4 Buf. I. 32. 5 sok. HI. 11. 



PERSECUTION. 22t 

ing on his vehement encouragement of Paganism, speaks a 
little later thus in quite general terms ^: — 

' He went cleverly to work. Having seen wkat honour was 
paid to the confessors in the persecution of Diocletian, and 
knowing the forwardness of many to become confessors, he re- 
venged himself by taking the other line. He eschewed Dio- 
cletian's harsher way, though he by no means kept clear of pe?'- ' 
secution ; for all troubling whatsoever of peaceable men I call 
persecution ; and he troubled the Christians thus : — by prohibitive 
educational laws ; that they might not, as he said, whet their 
tongues and be a match for Pagan disputants.' 

Thus Sokrates supports Rufinus in his general verdict, 
and in representing Julian's rescript on education as the 
crown of his persecutions. 

Sozomen as usual goes farther still in candour of state- 
ment on Julian's behalf^. He says that the Emperor, 

'while minded in every way to support Paganism, accounted the 
compulsion or punishment of unwilling worshippers ill-advised;'' 

and at greater length writes in these terms ^ : — 

* From the first, though devoid of all feeling for the Christians, 
he showed himself more humane than preceding persecutoi'S ; their 
example proved that penalties were of no service to the establish- 
ment of Paganism ; nay, were the surest promoters of Christianity, 
which won lustre from the courage of willing martyrs for the 
faith. In jealousy not in mercy, he thought it unnecessary to 
work conversions by fire or by sword or by mutilations, or by 
drowning or burying alive, or such like favourite means. He 
hoped to pervert the masses to Paganism by argument and ex- 
hortation, and expected easily to compass his end by eschewing 
violence and adopting an unexpected policy of indulgence.* 

Theodoret is too consistently hostile to extenuate thus his TUodoret, 
bill of indictment, but S. Jerome^ admirably sums up Julian's Jerome. 
system as 'a gentle violence that strove to win not drive,' 
while Orosius^ finds the Apostate guilty of assailing Christi- Orosius. 
anity by craft rather than repression, making perverts by 
stimulating their ambition, not by playing upon their fears. 

1 Sok. m. 12. 2 soz. y. xt. 8. ' ^ goz. y. iv. 6, 7. 

4 Jer. Euseb. Chron. p. 504. ^ Oros. vii. 30. 



222 



JULIAN. 



Summanj. The allegations adduced to prove Julian a persecutor 
have now been fully marshalled. The bulk of them ap- 
peared, even in combination, insufficient to convict Julian 
of personal responsibility for persecution in its extreme 
forms ; in individual cases he allowed justice to be overruled 
and as it were cozened by prejudice; more than once he 
winked at barbarities of Pagans more fanatical than him- 
self; in one notable instance he degraded himself to genuine 
persecution, though the pains inflicted were not of a corporal 
kind. The evidence of reported facts has next been com- 
pared with confessions extracted from Julian's own writings, 
and wdth admissions extorted from the principal witnesses 
on either side : these have on the whole remarkably corro- 
borated the previous conclusions ; and if details here and 
there furnish matter for doubt, on the whole assurance of 
the main truth has been attained, and but few contradictions 
remain unreconciled. 



Julianas 
intentions. 



Here then the inquiry would naturally end. But the 
writings of previous historians seem to force upon us the 
unwelcome question, 'Would Julian have become an open 
persecutor, had power remained longer in his grasp?' A 
complete answer would entail a thankless and distasteful 
discussion, necessarily arriving at no sure result. The evi- 
dence, if indeed it can be called evidence, is meagre enough. 
It consists of surmises and inferences and laborious deduc- 
tions of Gregory and his copiers : Julian's vague menaces 
uttered, or maybe not even uttered, in moments of irri- 
tation, have been reported^ and magnified. He was said to 
have threatened on his victorious return from Persia to pro- 
claim war to the knife with all Christians : the hand of God 
was traced in the dart that pierced his side. But it is not 
before Jerome^ that the precise statement occurs that Julian 
on marching against the Persians had devoted the blood of 
the Christians to the Gods after the victory : it was reserved 
for the insight of Jerome's pupil, Orosius*, to lay bare the full 

^ E.g. cf. Buinart, Acta de Sancto Theodora confessore. 
2 Jer. Euseh. Chron. p. 504. ^ Qros. vu. 30. 



PERSECUTION. 223 

blackness of his guilt : reiterating the master's words, he 
corroborates them thus : ^ 

' For he actually ordered the restoration of the amphitheatre 
at Jerusalem, intending on his return from Parthia to cast the 
bishops and all the holy monks' of that district to the beasts and 
make a spectacle of their sufferings!' 

Modern historians^, with few exceptions, have argued in Accepted 
the same direction. Inference and assertion are as easy as 
they are unsafe; 'of all forms of lying prophecy is the most i 
gratuitous.' There is no doubt not a little to be plausibly ( 
urged in support of such a view, Throiighout Julian's tenure 
of power a growing bitterness of tone is patent, manifesting 
itself in act and word alike. It was from Antioch he chas- Julian at 
tised the Csesareans, and wrote his contemptible letter to the 
Bostrenians ; from Antioch that he penned his savage letters 
against Athanasius ; at Antioch once more that he composed 
the Misopogon, commenced his work against the Christians, 
and wrote his satirical jeu d'esprit the Ccesars, which closes 
with the bitterest and most cold-blooded of .all his scoffs at 
Christianity. Corresponding to this change in his own tone, 
increased remissness is displayed in curbing the excesses of 
imperial officers, and in one case at least deliberate con- 
nivance in the torture of Christians, which was warranted by 
suspicions only and not actual facts. 

But there remains on the other side the broad indispu- 
table fact that throughout the empire at large religious 
toleration was both the law and the practice. In the West I 
there was absolute freedom from persecution; in the East ' 

1 Compare the droll tale of Julian's tame devil and the monk Puhlius in 
Kedrenus i. p. 526, Glykas iv. p. 472. Cf. also Kedr. p. 531. 

^ Lam§, Julien I'Apostat, p. 163, goes perhaps furthest, and predicts with 
pleased assurance that Julian would have persecuted hard and persecuted 
successfully. ' Si les persecutions des autres empereurs n'avaient point 
emplch^ le nombre des chr^tiens de s'accroltre, c'est qu'ils frappaient les 
corps sans pourvoir aux besoins des esprits ; Julidn avait pris I'ordre in- 
verse Une persecution dirigee par Julien se fut done accomplie dans les 

meilleures conditions pour le succfes ; I'extinetion du paganisme par I'^pee 
des empereurs chr^tiens prouve qu'il est possible de supprimer une rehgion 
par la violence, pourvu qu'on ait su la remplacer en lui prenant tout ce 
qu'elle avait de bon.' 



224 JULIAN. 

extremely little, and that little induced by local disturbances 
or the bias of individual magistrates. If it be true that a 
relentless doom would have driven Julian to the last huge 
wrong, it is beyond dispute that to the end he struggled 
hard against that Nemesis of apostasy. It would have been 
hard to devise a fiercer ordeal than a prolonged stay at 
Antioch. Alone in policy, in sympathies, in patient and 
heroic efforts to restore virtue to a soulless corpse, encircled 
by flatterers and deceived by knaves, secretly ridiculed by 
Pagans and openly defied by Christians, meeting with no 
allowance for mistakes and no response to leniency, the 
young impetuous Emperor might have been sick at heart 
and fretted into outrage, even in some secluded retreat. 
But at Antioch these feelings must have been aggravated 
to tenfold force. The town where men had been first 
called Christians retained its old character; it was a nu- 
cleus of Christianity still, the very core of Church life in 
Asia. But its Christianity was of a type specially offensive 
to a disbelieving philosopher. It was noisy, turbulent, de- 
monstrative. Nowhere, unless at Alexandria, did party spirit 
run so high. The town was usually split into rival camps. 
Many a stormy council had met at Antioch. It was the 
nursing-mother of Arian ^ disputants, the prolific birthplace 
of heretic'^ creeds : not five years before Julian's arrival the 
most violent Anomoeans of the East had chosen Antioch as 
the rendezvous from which to send their synodal congratu- 
lations to Valens the Anomoean of the West. The very year 
before his appearance the appointment of a non- Arian bishop^ 
had caused a tumult in the open church and been the signal 
for a schism, which lasted out the century. Apart from 
religious feuds the mob ten years previously had first kicked 

^ Cf. Newman's Avians of the Fourth Century, Chap. i. § 1. 

^ At the Council of Dedication at Antioch 341 a.d. five new creeds were 
drawn lap, succeeded in 345 by the so-called macrostich. 

2 Meletius, chosen by the Arians, disappointed his partisans by an 
orthodox confession. He was banished, and Euzoius elected in his stead. 
The unfortunate attempt of a commission headed by Lucifer of Cagliari to 
restore peace, ended in his setting up a new party, which bore his name and 
survived for fiftj' years. 



PERSECUTION. 225 • 

the life out of an innocent governor, and then torn in pieces 
his mangled remains. Such scenes were hardly uncommon*. 
A spirit of rancour was abroad among all classes, high and 
low. Julian was constantly called to face and endure this. 
He was the butt of ribald jeers, of seditious libels'^, of curses, 
of damnatory prayers ^ Publia and her virgins regaled him 
with abusive Psalms; irreligious wags nicknamed him 
' Slaughterer ' ; rude scoffers at philosophy dubbed him 
'Goat'*; squibs, lampoons, scurrilous rhymes ran riot. How Jfw. seiBc, 
galling these petty insults were it is not easy to picture : 
measures of conciliation, generous attempts to cripple ex- mu. ssa. 
tortion and alleviate distress, all met with a like response. 
Pagans and Christians, rich and poor, landowners and sales- 
men, combined^ to hinder the Emperor's designs and thwart 355. 357 », 
his measures of reform. He tried to stem vulgarity and 
immorality ; to break the tyranny of capitalists, and check 
the noisy Sansculottism of the mob: jeers, misrepresent- 
ations, abuse, were all the thanks he got. The giddy 
populace were to be won only by frivolous and degrading 342 e 
exhibitions® such as their conscientious ruler declined to 
give. To them the Emperor, his friends, and his views were 354 c 
strangers and intruders. Much as he despised these 'frogs 358 a 
of the marsh,' Julian smarted sorely under the unpopularity 
and contempt with which his overtures were met. He felt 344 b 
himself unappreciated ; he knew that he deserved better of 
the unworthy citizens. He was altogether misunderstood, 
underrated, despised, and he dwelt on it bitterly. Every 
line of the Misopogon is saturated with this feeling. He was 
aware moreover that it was the very elevation of his aims, 

1 Amm. M. xiv. vii. 6, 3Iis. 370 c, ef. Amm. M. xiv. vii. 16. 

2 Mis. 364 B, 361 a. 

3 Mis. 344 A, with which cf. Greg. Naz. Or. xviii, c. 32, and Soz. vi. 2 
concerning Didymns. 

4 e^Trjs, Tpayos, Zonar. xni. 12. For the latter of. Mis. 339 a. ; for both, 
with others to hoot, Amm. M. xxii. xiv. 3. 

* Cf. specially the conduct of the merchants during the scarcity of pro- 
visions at Antioch. Sok. in. 17, Soz. v. 19, Mis. 350, 368 c— 370 b. 
fl Mis. 339 c, 340 A, 342 e, 354 c, 359 d, 365 ; of. Liban. Epit. p. 579. 

R. E. 15 



22(5 JULIAN. 

the sincere toleration, the self-imposed restraints of power*, 
that reduced him to this predicament. It is hardly possible 
to conceive of stronger temptations to persecution : tolera- 
tion for the intolerant, forbearance towards the overbearing, 
without even the recompence of gratitude, were incessantly- 
required of him. He was himself being persecuted at every 
turn for his religion ; that he knew well was the secret of 
his unpopularity; he had but to speak the word, and an 
ample harvest of retaliation could be reaped ; and yet he 
refrained himself at the risk of alienating friends and with 
the certainty of emboldening enemies ; he stedfastly set his 
face against persecution- ; and only once or twice, when ex- 
asperated beyond patience, deviated from the attitude he 
had taken up. 

It is possible perhaps in this matter to go further still. 
If it is at all admitted that incitements to persecution, 
and aggravations to forbearance reached at Antioch a pitch 
that could hardly have become intensified however long 
Julian had retained imperial power, and that he neverthe- 
less adhered to his policy of toleration, other consequences 
may perhaps be deduced. It will be granted that Julian 
would not have followed the blood-stained track of a Decius 
or a Diocletian : it will be admitted that he was at least too 
shrewd in statesmanship, if not too true to philosophical 
conviction, to renew against ever-swelling superiority of 
force a battle lost irrevocably half a century before'^: and 
more, it will be remembered that too great breadth of tolera- 
tion was one of the charges levelled against Julian ; it will 
be noted with fresh interest that it was the dead, irrespon- 
sive sloth of Paganism that soured his blood more even than 
the antagonism of believers ; it might in a sanguine moment 
be conjectured, or at least not dismissed from the region of 
hope, that, if eighteen months of rule had taught and dis- 
ciplined and disenchanted Julian so much, added years 



1 Mis. 343 A, 357 d, &c. &c. &c. 

'■* The toleration Edict of Galerius, 310 a. d. 



PERSECUTION. 227 

might have strengthened him to probe the diseased lie, 
and forsake deluding shadows and fruitless hopes for a creed 
more solid and aspirations more satisfying. If the historian 
must silence such a hope, at least let Ausonius' kindly epitaph 
on Titus be vouchsafed to the Apostate too, 

FELIX BREVITATE EEGENDI. 



15—2 



CHAPTER IX. 

JULIAN AND CHRISTIANITY. 



" Out of this stuff, these forces, thou art grown, 
And proud self-severance from them were disease." 



Julian'* Julian's treatment of the Christians has been investigated 

Ss°"^ at length: the personal opinions that he entertained of 
tianity. Christianity and the Christians demand a separate examina- 
tion. Obviously the two questions are different. In the first 
case he acted as Emperor : in the second he thought as an 
individual. In the former his hands were in great measure 
tied by the mixed responsibilities of power; in the latter he 
was free as the unlettered peasant or the cultured philoso- 
pher. 

It is not too much to say that intellectually, morally and 
practically he totally misconceived Christianity. Before the 
death of Constantino, and in a still greater degree of course 
at the death of Constantius, Christianity had attained a posi- 
tion sufficient to prove that it was the conquering force then 
present in the world, that in its hands lay the future. During 
the half-century preceding Julian's accession it had gone 
forward with leaps and bounds: its numerical strength, its 
moral earnestness, its intellectual self-justification all entitled 
it to at least respect as an antagonist, if not to acceptance as 
a master. Yet Julian treated it with unconcealed and mis- 
calculating contempt. He professed and probably felt disdain 
as much as dislike. How could this be? In the first place 



CHRISTIANITY, 229 

he was singularly unfortunate in his contact with it. Alike Contact 
in the court of Constantius, and in his early education and ^}*^^^'^i^- 
youth, Christianity came before him in the person of most 
unworthy representatives^; on the throne hardly less than in 
the schoolroom the same ill-fortune dogged him. The cordi- 
ality and impartiality of his numerous invitations availed him 
nothing. It was high time to prove that not all bishops were 
dissimulators, and not all prelates politicians: so the worthier 
with one consent held aloof from the Apostate. Athanasius 
indubitably represents the highest consciousness of the Chris- 
tian Church of Julian's day. If there was one episcopal ap- 
pointment more grievous a scandal to the Church than another, 
that of Aetius might probably be singled out. First a peddling 
tinker, next a quack, next a sophist, the coryphaeus of heretics 
and the bane of the Church, he had won his spurs as 'the 
Atheist^' before in Julian's reign he attained the bishopric 
of Constantinople. Such were the two men. Athanasius 
Julian can scarcely mention without bad language: Aetius* 
above every ecclesiastic he delighted to honour; not content 
with receiving him at court he conferred upon him in addi- 
tion an estate in Mitylene. Can facts speak plainer? In 
this respect Julian certainly deserves commiseration, but 
must not therefore elude just blame. If not in boyhood, at 
least as a man he had ample opportunities for forming a 
judgment from fairer specimens of Christianity than an 
Aetius or a Hekebolius. Basil the Great and Gregory of 
Nazianzus were his college associates; will rather than occa- 
sion must have been lacking if he never met Christian 
leaders such as Hilary of Poitiers or Eusebius of Vercellae: 
doubtless their society would have been distasteful to him. 
The sequel to Julian's vain endeavours to pervert the young 
CsGsarius* was his retirement from court, a practical commen- 
tary neutralising pages of trim professions. 



^ Sclilosser dwells on the rapid degeneracy of the Christian clergy after 
the accession of Constantine. 

2 He was surnamed "Affeos : he was the founder of the Anomoeans, the 
most openly unchristian of Arian sects. 

» Cf. Soz. V. v., and Jul., Ep. 31, * Supr. p. 143. 



230 JULIAN. 

Chrit. Julian's primary misconception of Christianity was in 

tchenu " regarding it as a sheer contrivance \ a kind of mutual benefit 
society set up solely in the interests of the managers. He had 
found so much hypocrisy among Christians that he assumed 

cyr. 333B-Dit of them all. S. John's attribution of divinity to Christ 
was a clever fraud: the whole fabric of sacerdotalism was 
so much ingenious mechanism: the clergy were ambitious 

£». 52. 436- schemers; if deprived of the power to tyrannise and dictate 
and appropriate other men's goods, they at once became 
centres of faction, professional incendiaries, whose work it 
was to inflame party against party in their own selfish 
interests. The monks — except indeed in those cases where 

iist ^^' tbey had been driven by devils into the wilderness and pro- 
vided with manacles and collars^ — were no better; their 
assumed self-renunciation was a sham. At a small sacrifice 
for the most part, they had made a lucrative investment. 
In exchange for the paltry property or positions they had 
surrendered, these so-called 'Renouncers^' were everywhere 
courted, caressed, and obsequiously followed, besides recoup- 
ing themselves in hard cash into the bargain. Monasticism 
was in Julian's eyes a low type of the false Cynicism he so 
hotly denounced. To him almsgiving and charities were 
but ingenious devices to support the ascendancy of a ruling 

Frafi. Ep. casto. He compares the Christians to kidnappers, who tempt 
children by mouthfuls of cake, and finally catch them and 
fling them into confinement, to spend a life of misery as the 
cost of the transient sweet that tickled their palate for the 
nonce. If Pagans did but imitate the cunning of the Chris- 
tians on more magnanimous motives, they would soon occupy 
the same position of influence. 



^ Frag. Ep. 305 c b, Ejj. 49. 429 n, Ep. 51. 435, and esp. Cyril 39 a tuv 
VaXiXaluv t] CKevupla ir\&efia icrriv avOpdiruv, v^jrh KaKovpyias avvrediv ?xoy(7a 
fikv oiZkv delov, diroxPV^^>^^''1 ^^ '''V ^'^o/ti/^tfJ Kal iraidaptuSei. Kal dvo^qrif) 
TTJs ^vxvs pi.opi(^, Trjv TepoLToKoyiav els ttLcttlv ■^yayev dXrjddas. 

2 Cf. Jerome Ep. 22, Ad Eustoch., § 28 (Migne, vol. i.). 

3 diroTaKTicrral, Or. 7. 224 B. Apparently all MSS. insert the cr. I do not 
know that the word occurs elsewhere. For diroraKTiTai, see Epiphan. ii. 129. 
Presumably they are the dtroTci^an^voL (of. Bingham, Ant. vii. 2). 



CHRISTIANITY. 231 

Besides this arrant and pervading duplicity with which Christians 
he charges them, Julian attributed a variety of other vices "*^*"^" ^^ ' 
to the Christians. Not content with condemning individuals, 
he regards envy, strife and slander as characteristic of the Frag. Ep. 
Christian profession, a mistake which cost him not a few 
practical blunders. He represents Christians as drawn from 
the lowest and most degraded portions of society. He ex- 
tends this reproach to primitive Christians as well as his own 
contemporaries, and avails himself of S. Paul's^ black cata- cyr. 206ab, 

^ . 238 E, 245 B c. 

logue of crimes to prove that from the very first the Church 
had been recruited from the criminal ranks. There was con- 
siderable truth in the remark as a fact. The lowest and the 
highest strata of society'^ were still, as at the first, those from 
which Christianity derived its strength. Content with this 
fact, and keenly alive to the shortcomings of Christians, 
Julian precipitately inferred a condemnation of the religion 43 b 
itself. He was blind to the moral power of Christianity upon 
the life. Bigotry and prejudice revealed to him only the 
narrowness, violence and duplicity so rife amid contemporary 
Christians. In his belief they greedily assimilated all that 
was bad, rejecting what was good: and this no less in the 
religious and intellectual than in the moral and social sphere. 
Having abandoned the worship of the eternal Gods they 
preferred to worship the Galilean carpenter who died as 
a felon: disdaining to adore King Sun, they deified a Jewish 194 d 
corpse; nay, not content with one man or one corpse, they JSp. 62. 438 c. 
worshipped many corpses and dead men's bones without ^^/^P- gj, 
number. As in worship, so too in ceremonial. Even in the ^'■- ^-2280. 
law they still professed to revere, they rebelliously rejected 
all that was most venerable and estimable. Like leeches cyr. 202 a, 
they sucked only the bad blood out of the Mosaic code, 
leaving the purer portion. The same principle of perverse 
assimilation ruled their intellectual tastes. To the Greeks 
belonged science and culture; to the Christians unreason and 
stolidity^. Their own literature was stuff fit only for slaves; 2290-230 a 

1 Eom. i. 

2 Beugnot makes this remark, which Chastel endorses, p. 95: cf. also 
Lam4 p. 41. 

3 Greg. Naz. Or. iv, cii. 



232 



JULIAN. 



Cyr. 238 b 



Julianas 
Polemics 
against 
Chris- 
tianity. 



Meta- 
physical 
objections, 
Cyr. 58. 65 



Greek literature with all its exquisite beauties they at once 
reprobated and pursued ; here as elsewhere, taking a perverse 
delight in culling from it what was worst instead of what 
was choicest, and so weaving therefrom a web of mischief. 

Not satisfied with such general denunciations, Julian 
probed deeper, and was at great pains to refute the Galileans 
by argument as well as abuse or contempt. His controver- 
sial objections to Christianity were committed to seven* 
books, denied to us by the orthodox anxieties of his suc- 
cessors^ Happily the three earlier books survive, embedded 
in the elaborate refutation by Cyril. 

To begin with the metaphysical objections, the origin of 
evil, the creation of matter, the creation of mortal natures 
directly by God are all handled, and contrasted unfavourably 
with the Platonic theory of creation by mediary agents. 
Between the Christian and the Neo-Platouist system lies the 
fundamental difference that whereas Christians regarded 
evil as entering into the world through the Fall, as a super- 
vening accident therefore and not an inherent necessity in the 
constitution of things, Neo-Platonists accepted a Manichean 
belief in the pi-ecedent eternity and with it the final inde- 
structibility of evil. The creation or even sufferance of evil 
in a world created by God they deemed incompatible with 
the absolute unity and holiness of the Godhead. This line of 
attack, however, is so slightly pressed, compared with what 
might naturally be expected, that it is a safe conjecture that 
either Cyril's report is imperfect or that the subject was 
reserved for treatment in one of the lost books*. 

^ Three according to Cyril, but seven according to Jer. Ep. 70 Ad 
Magnum (Migne, vol. i.): perhaps Cyril formally refuted three only out of 
the seven; Herwerden, p, 45, finds in Theoph. Chron, p. 80, a slender 
confirmation of this theory. A passage quoted by Sok. iii. 23 does not 
occur in Cyril's extracts. On this cf. Desjardins, 148 pp. The fullest and 
best arranged summary of their contents I have met with is in Herwerden's 
De Iiil. Imp. pp. 44—815, 97—138. 

2 Law of Theodosius II. 

3 At the same time the remains of the work are almost entirely destruc- 
tive. This quite accords with Sokrates' criticism {ff. E. iii. xxiii. 7). ' The 
books are too vituperative. They are purely combative, not argumentative. 
Kot having truth on his side, he tried to discredit established facts by 



CHRISTIANITY. 233 

Relying mainly on the anthropomorphisms of the Old Christian 
Testament Julian further asserts the moral obliquity of the If^Q^^^""' 
Christian conception of God. Human passions are assigned attackedus 

'I'lnfi/fYhOTCiL 

to him. He is represented as a jealous God, not above anger cyr. 152 c' 
and indignation, as confounding the innocent with the guilty 
(Numb. XXV.) ; and in his blind passion taking an indis- leo »-i6i b 
criminate revenge upon tens and hundreds of thousands, out 
of all proportion to the offence committed, in retaliation for the 
sin of a few. Again, he is meanly envious ; he forbade man 
to take of the tree of wisdom, and yet more reprehensibly 93 K-94 a 
tried to deny him the knowledge of good and evil. Truly 
the imitation of such a God (which philosophers commend) 
would have strange and disastrous results. The unsightly 
representation is doubtless due in part to wilful dissembling i46 b 
on the part of Moses. 

The Christian or Jewish God is not only immoral, but as un- 
curiously impotent and short-sighted. He created Eve as ^"J^ 9/^. 
man's helpmate, and she turned out his seducer and worst 
enemy. He tried to debar men from the knowledge of good 89 a, 93 b, 
and evil, and was then outwitted by them. Next, becoming 
frightened of men, he adopted the awkward device of pro- 134 D-135 c 
ducing a confusion of tongues. In his dealings with Gods he 
betrays equal helplessness : he cannot prevent that worship 
of false Gods of which he is said to be jealous. Once again 155 cd 
the Jewish conception of God's partiality in confining his 
solicitude and government to a special people most in- 99 e, io6, 
juriously limits both the power and the sphere of his work- 
ing. To the enlightened philosopher such an idea must 115 n-iie b 
appear no less false in fact than it is petty in conception. 
The polytheistic^ idea of God's superintendence of the whole 
world by appointed agents is a far nobler one. And what is 
more, it alone is borne out by history : if history proves any- 

Barcastic ridicule, ' In Lamp's words, the proper title for thfi work is ' Eefu- 
tation of Jadaism and Galileism,' rather than 'Defence of Paganism.' {Jul. 
VApost. p. 149). 

1 In Cyr. 69, 72, 146 b, 155, 238, 253, Julian tries to fasten polytheism 
on O. T. writers by the help of Gen, xi. 7, Ex. xxii, 28, &c. Cf. also Cyr. 
100, 238, 290, on Ex. iv. 22, 23, v. 3, vii. 16, Deut. xxxii. 9, Gen. vi. 2. 



234 JULIAN, 

thing, it proves both in ancient and modem times that the 
cjT. 209 D- Jews are a God-forsaken race, not the special favourites of 

210a,213a, , _ , _ . , . . . ^ • Ti^ii 

218 A-a the Deity. In material prosperity their career is little more 
than a succession of captivities ; Egyptians, Philistines, Assy- 
rians, Babylonians, Syrians, Romans have one after another 
176 B c, 178 B, triumphed over them; while as for general enlightenment 
221 e', 224'c d, they fall hopelessly behind the Chaldeans, the Greeks, and 

229 c— 230 A. '' ^ . -^ 

many other nations. 

Defects of Julian further impugning the defects of Scripture finds 

Scripture. ^-^^^ the revelation of God therein contained is not only 

false and immoral, but also strangely incomplete. For in- 

49 D stance there is hardly a word as to the creation or function 

of angels, and intermediary spirits. Though they are again 

86 c-B, 99. and again mentioned — whether obscurely, as in Gen. vi. 2, 4, 
or directly- — it is left altogether undetermined whether they 
are created by God, or emanant from some other source, or 
unbegotten. Neither are proper distinctions drawn between 
acts of creation and acts of arrangement of pre-existent 
material. Various rationalistic objections are next brought 
86 A against the credibility of Scripture. In what language, it is 
scoffingly asked, did the serpent talk ? How is the account 
of the tower of Babel less fabulous or ridiculous than 

134 D 135 c Homer's myth of giants piling Pelion upon Ossa? In a 

similar tone the discordance between the genealogies in 

253 E Matthew and Luke is commented on. Further the literary 

defects of Scripture receive severe animadversion, and are 

229C-230A elaborately contrasted with the excellencies of Greek litera- 
ture. The prophets are derided^ and the Hebrew tongue 
maligned. Julian likewise assails the want of unity between 
the different parts of Scripture. The ceremonial law for 
instance was given by God. Moses expressly says that it is 
319 D E to be eternal ; ' Ye shall keep it a feast to the Lord, through- 
out your generations; ye shall keep it a feast by an ordinance 
for ever^ ; and to the same sense elsewhere. Christ reiterated 
351 B c a similar injunction ; ' Think not I am come to destroy the 

^ Frag. Ep. 294, 295, witli which compare particular criticisms in Cyril, 
p. 253 (cf. 259), 262, and Theod. Mops, in Munter, i. p. 136. 
., 2 Ex. xii. 24. 



CHRISTIANITY. 235 

law and the prophets ; 1 am not come to destroy but to 
fulfil^,' and yet Paul has the audacity to say that 'Christ is cyr. 320A 
the end of the law,' and Christians with one consent system- 
atically neglect every one of its provisions. Again, Moses' 299 a, sos b— 

„ ^^T . . , . o 1 -I 306a,351a — c. 

entire ignorance 01 Christ is obvious ; the supposed pro- 
phecies of Christ, whether in Moses or elsewhere, are com- 
.pletely at fault : and it is again and again repeated that the 159 e, 253 bc, 
worship of Christ is a defiant breach of the first command- 
ment of the Jewish Law. Passing to the New Testament, Depreeia- 
we find Julian persistently endeavouring to depreciate the ^"^ tJ-^ 
character of the witnesses. He speaks scoffingly of Matthew^ tament. 

Ep. 12. 423 D, 

and Luke , and in more general terms of the fraudulent cyr. 218 a. 
machinations of the Evangelists. While the Jewish prophets 
are in his eyes foolish babblers, who but chattered to old (^'^^- ^p- 
women, in S. John he discerns a scheming and audacious 
impostor, who ventured to intrude upon the credulity of 
Christians novel" and blasphemous beliefs as to the divinity cvr. 213 b, 

/. /"11 • 1 • 11- 1 • /^ 1 1 -n 1 262 D, 327 a— 

01 Christ, his person, and his relation to Uod the ±!ather. 0,333 b-d. 
S. Peter is a hypocrite, and the differences between him and 325 c 
S. Paul are enlarged upon, while the latter, the arch-impostor 99 b 
and magician, is said, 'as occasion suits, like a polypus oniosB 
the rocks, to shift his doctrines about God.' 

Of our Lord himself Julian speaks in a slighting rather Julian's 
than bitter or blasphemous tone. He recognises neither ^Q^^ist 
novelty, nor beauty, nor force in his teaching, comments on 
his ill success in converting his own kindred and nation, and ^p- 51. 433 d, 

° _ _ ' Cyr. 213 a b. 

concludes that he did nothing worthy of mention, except 
perhaps a few miracles of healing or exorcism in out-of-the- 191 b 
way villages of Palestine. He looked upon the ' carpenter's 
son' with an aristocratic disdain, that must for ever discredit 

1 Matt. V. 17. 

2 Cyril 262, 290 e. Elsewhere Julian insists on tlie verbal interpretation 
of the Messianic prophecy by Moses, 'The Lord our God will raise up 
a prophet for you among our brethren like unto me, ' 253 c d. 

3 The call of Matthew he rejects on internal evidence. Jer. ad Mat. ix. 9. 
* He refuses credit to Luke's account of the angelic apparition in Geth- 

semane, because (1) the disciples were asleep, (2) John makes no mention of 
it. 

5 Cf. Cyr. 327 a and 385 b where Julian explicitly says that neither Paul 
nor any of the three other evangelists dared to call Jesus God. 



236 JULIAN. 

his power of moral insight. Christ's teaching appeared to 

him weak, unpractical, and subversive of society*. He did 

cyr. 206 b, not think him a bad man, or a scheming man, or a deluded 

man, but just an unlettered peasant, who had lived some three 

hundred years ago, when Augustus and Tiberius were great. 

There are times when a peevish jealousy breaks out as 

though Christ were pitted in a personal rivalry against 

C£esar^ and defrauding him of the tribute due; but ebullitions 

of that kind are casual and kept out of Julian's set polemics 

against Christianity. 

Of Chris- The highest mysteries of the Christian faith he treats 

tianmys. ^^^^j^ unsparing contempt. He of course rejects the divinity 

of Christ ; he unsparingly denounces the whole doctrine of 

the Trinity^, which originated in the obscure imagination of 

194,201.206, 'the good John*'; and special taunts are directed against the 

253e,262de. ^^g^^^ of the Miraculous Conception, of Atonement by 

213 b Christ's death, and of the premundane existence of Christ. 

Christian 'faith' put him out of all patience ^ Against the 

sacramental® efficacy of baptism he indulges a special spite : 

ca«. 336 A B in his satirical Caesars he jeers at the thought of Constan- 

tine deserting the ideal of holy life, and after being lapped 

in the arms of luxury and self-indulgence, turning at last to 

Jesus, and being washed in baptismal water pure from the 

Cyr. 245 D taint of sin. ' Baptism,' he exclaims in his work against the 

Christians, 'does not take away the scales of leprosy, nor 

ringworm, nor scurvy, nor warts, nor gout, nor dysentery, 

nor dropsy, nor the whitlow, nor bodily ailments small or 

great, but will clean drive out adultery and theft, and moral 

transgressions one and all.' The taint of his own baptism he 

endeavoured, we have seen, to wash out by initiatory rites, 

1 Sok. in. 14, Ep. 43, 79, Cyril 335. 

" Henrik Ibsen introduces this effectively in the closing act of his Julian 
the Emperor. 

2 This is interesting as showing how widely apart the Christian and 
Neo-Platonic ideas of the Trinity were. 

■* 6 xpicT'is 'l(t)avvr)%, Cyr. 327 A. 
5 Greg. Naz. Or. iv. e. 102, p. 637 a. 

« Herwerden, p. 82 and 135, detects an uncertain allusion to the Lord's 
Supper in the word Bvalav, Cyr. 306 A. 



CHRISTIANITY. ■237 

and each Christian peirvert was bidden to undergo some such Ep. 52. 436 c 
purificatory process. 

Thus Julian's formal objections to Christianity, so far as Julian's 
they have been preserved, are less metaphysical in kind than ^^^i ^f^^, 
might be anticipated. Many of them represent a low range tudeto- 
of thought \ such as far worse and far duller men of the chris- 
present epoch would disdain. Large extracts from Julian's ^*«"^*y' 
works are well suited to the National Beformer, and might . 
even repay translation. Briefly his intellectual attitude may ; 
be described as that of modern rationalism of the coarser i 
kind with the following modifications. First, in common | 
with almost all thinkers of his day, and more particularly as 
himself a Neo-Platonist, he takes no exception to the records c^r. 191 b 
of miracles in Scripture. Exhibitions of miraculous power '^ 
were in his view hardly worth notice, much less evidences of | 
divine agency. Secondly, the class of objections commonly 
called scientific were necessarily as yet undeveloped, though 
discernible in germ, for instance in the asserted inadequacy 
of the legend about Babel to explain the diversity of 
languages found on the earth. Thirdly, criticism had not 
yet commenced its destructive work; partly that the science 
was as yet but little advanced; and still more perhaps that at 
that day materials of proof were too abundant to admit of 
such statements or theories as at the present day can be 
plausibly supported, so as at times, even if untrue, to defy 
refutation. Be that as it may, Julian accepts both Old and 
New Testament intact, and in particular refers to S. John's 
Gospel throughout as the undoubted testimony of the apostle. 
On the other hand, Julian could press far more forcibly than 
the modern rationalist the recentness of the rise of Christi- 
anity and the lateness of its appearance in the world's 
history ; nor had he to deal in the same way with Church 
life and development as an evidence for the truth of the 
religion. He does not fail to taunt Christians with ' having 
invented new-fangled rites of sacrifice.' His view of the 306 a 
moral character both of Christ and his disciples is rather 

1 Neander, Church Hist. iii. 112 pp., with his usual just discrimination, 
points out the weakness and insufficiency of much of Julian's attack. 



238 



JULIAN. 



Julian's 
unfairness 
to Chris- 
tianity. 



Cyr. 168 b 



Julian's 
bitterness 
towards 
Chris- 
tianity. 

JEp. 63. 454 B 
Ep. 9. 378 B 

Its result. 



that of the school of Voltaire, than of the more enlightened 
scepticism of Strauss or Renan. 

Underlying almost all Julian's polemics against Christi- 
anity there is a covert comparison between it and the Neo- 
Platonist religion which he desired to substitute. The biblical 
account of creation is contrasted disadvantageously with that 
found in Plato: the Jewish idea of God with the philo- 
sopher's. The statement that the God of Moses is less gentle 
than Lykurgus, less forbearing than Solon, less just or benign 
than Numa, is a typical one. Jewish wisdom, Jewish law, 
Jewish literature, Jewish history, Jewish life, social or political, 
are set side by side with their counterparts, as most favour- 
ably represented, in Greece or Rome or Eg}^pt. Throughout 
there is a certain, and in part it must be owned, conscious 
unfairness. Not only does Julian misunderstand the anthro- 
pomorphisms of the Old Testament, not only does he fail to 
see the principle of progressiveness in God's self-revelation to 
mankind, not only does he argue sophistically or mock un- 
kindly or blaspheme offensively, but there is this pervading 
injustice in his attack, that he compares ideal Paganism with 
ordinary secular Christianity. For the Pagan he assumes 
that the philosopher's secret is the peasant's creed; for the 
Christian that the individual's failure is the system's con- 
demnation. 

In a word in Julian's judgment of Christians candour is 
no match for prejudice. He misrepresents their character ; 
he denies them the name they adored^; in his mouth they 
are 'Galileans,' or 'infidels,' or 'atheists,' and their religion is 
the plague-spot of the Galilean mispersuasion ; he profanes 
or curses all they hold most sacred : he breathes a wish that 
all their literature could be expunged from existence. This 
bitterness could not but engage him in serious errors : it 
warped his judgment, and dulled his observation. He saw 
their factiousness and augured their ruin ; he imagined that 



^ Once only does the word Xpia-navoi occur in Julian's writings, and on 
that occasion it is in a quotation from a bishop's letter : ef. Ep. 52. 437 d. 
According to Greg. Naz. Or. it. c. Ixxvi. p. 602, Julian prescribed the use of 
the term ' Galilean ' by law. 



CHRISTIANITY. 289 

the interpositions of Constantine and Constantius had alone 
frustrated suicide : he gave them rope to hang themselves. 

Deceived by external symptoms he missed the in- Miscalcu- 
ternal solidity of their religion : he did not comprehend contempo- 
the hold it had upon men's hearts : it appealed, he thought, raryfdrces, 
to all that was puerile, superficial, transient, in the nature of 
man. He supposed it to be a charlatanism, better contrived 
than most, which imposed upon mankind by assumed authority, 
by stilted gravity, by frowns and by tears, by bribery and by Ep. «. 
caresses, by mysterious threats and by delusive promises, by 
all the paraphernalia with which designing men can catch 
the popular taste. ' He fell into the error, to which in all 
ages men of the world are exposed, of mistaking whatever 
shows itself on the surface of the Apostolic Community, its 
prominences and irregularities, all that is extravagant, and 
all that is transitory, for the real moving principle and life 
of the system^.' The truth is that he was continually looking 
backwards, not forwards^. Hellenism and the Roman Empire 
were the two colossal objects that blocked his line of vision. 
He failed to discern that their day was done, their strength 
worn out. In the midst of that world -heaving period of 
storm and stress, he miscalculated all the most valid forces. 
Christianity was to his vision a disintegrating power, fatal 
alike to the power of Rome and the power of Paganism. 
He was so far right^ But he did not discern that it was the 
force of the future : that if now it rocked the mountains that 
pressed upon it, it would shortly hurl them to the ground, 
and freed from the incubus walk forth erect amid the ruins, 
busy at its nobler creative work of planting the desolate 
places and renewing the face of the earth. He knew nothing 
of the struggle he had undertaken. 

^ Newman, Avians, dec, p. 354. 

2 Chateaubr. Mad. Hist. ii. p. 67. 

3 Cf. Montalembert, Monks of the West, Bk. i. 



CHAPTER X. 



JULIAN AND HELLENISM, 



' Schiine Welt, wo bist du ? Kehre wieder 
Holdes Bliithenalter der Natur! 
Ach, nur iu dem Feenland der Lieder 
Lebt noch deine fabelhafte Spur. 
Ausgestorben trauert das Gefilde, 
Keine Gottheit zeigt sicb meinem Blick, 
Ach, von jenem lebenwarmen Bilde 
Blieb der Schatten nur zuriick." 



Julian If Julian misinterpreted Christianity, his initial miscon- 

Itandsthe ception of Paganism was as grotesquely complete. His reac- 
Pagans. tion is the picture of a man plunging deeper and deeper into 
an impassable morass. Little by little the truth dawned 
upon him that he was a general without soldiers, and that no 
inch of ground he won could be permanently retained. 
Julian as It was from the literary side, in other words as Hellenism, 
that Paganism first fascinated Julian \ By inheritance, by 
instinct, and by training, he was possessed with a singular 
appetite for culture. From childhood, he says, he was smitten 
with a devouring passion for books. His beau-ideal of life 
was that of the student*^. At an early age he became an 
ardent book- collector. The happiest remembrance of his youth 
was that of days when in sight of the blue Propontis and 
dancing sails, he reclined on beds of convolvulus and thyme 
and clover with his eyes upon his book, able in the pauses of 

J Naville, p. 6 pp. 

2 Supr. p. 128, cf. Amm. M. xvi. 5, Lib. Ad lul. Hyp. p. 376, Jul. Ep. 
9. 378 A. 



Hellenist. 



HELLENISM. 241 

reading to feast upon the beauties of the scene \ Of all his 
wedding presents none charmed him so much as the library or. s. lu a b 
with which the Empress enriched him. Through his Gallic 
campaigns and in his Persian expedition his books 'followed 
him everywhere like his shadow^' On hearing of the death Ep. 27. i02B 
of Bishop George, it was Julian's chief solicitude that the 
prelate's library, with which in old days he had made ac- Ep. 9, Ep. se. 
quaintance, should not be broken up or spoiled. Of all his 
letters, Naville remarks, two only are to ladies ; the one pro- ^p- 21, Ep. 5. 
motes Kallixene the priestess; the other thanks 'the most 
worshipful' Theodora for a present of books! His knowledge 
of literature was most extensive^; not one of his associates, 
he says, had perused more volumes than himself. His own ^'s- sit a 
pages prove the intimacy of his knowledge of Greek authors*, 
before all others Homer and Plato. He himself was Greek 
to the core — 'enamoured of Greece,' writes Libanius^, 'above 
all of Athens the eye of Greece, Athene's town, the mother 
of Plato, Demosthenes and wisdom.' His pages^ teem wdth 
loving laudation most exactly corresponding to this descrip- 
tion. ' Though a Thracian maybe by birth, I count myself ^is. 367 c 
Greek by vocation' are his own words. He learnt of Greek 
teachers, selected Greek friends, wrote and thought in the 
Greek tongue, moved in a world of Greek ideas. Yet essen- 
tially Greek as he was, so wide was his literary range that he 
did not, like the disdainful schoolmen^ of his time, wholly 
ignore the language and literature of Pome. In Gaid he 
humorously laments that he had 'almost forgotten his 
Greek,' and not only could he talk Latin, but harangue 



^ Ep. 46. 427 B c. Cf. too Ep. 72, probably a spurious letter, in wMcli 
Julian during a river- voyage expatiates in tlie freedom from dust and noise, 
as lie passes ' his Phaedrus or some dialogue of Plato in his hand ' beneath 
groves of plane or cjrpress. 

2 Cf. Lib. Epit. p. 546. 3 Amm. M. xvi. v. 7. 

* More than 30 different Greek authors are quoted in his pages. Quota- 
tions from Homer alone considerably exceed 100. 

6 Lib, Epit. 531. 

« Or. m. 119 A— c, Or. iv. 152 d— 153 a, Or. v, 159 A, Or. viii. 252 b, Mis. 
348 c, and passim in ^Ep. ad Ath. 

'' Capes, JJniv. of Anc. Athens, p. 82. 

R.E. 16 



242 JULIAN. 

publicly in that language with sufficient ease\ His exten- 
sive knowledge of Roman History old and new, and of anec- 
dotes and sayings of Roman statesmen and emperors makes 
it certain that he indulged himself on occasion with Latin 
authors ^ 
Literary Nor did he possess merely literary appreciation. He was 

powa. endowed with literary faculties of no mean order. In Wie- 
buhr's judgment 'he was a true Attic, unequalled for elegance 
since the day of Dion Chrysostom.' He moulded his style on 
that of Libanius; but the judgment of posterity^ is unani- 
mous that the pupil surpassed the master. He did not 
emancipate himself from all the rhetorical vices of his age, 
from frigid affectations, from conceits, flourishes, and plethoric 
use of quotations, but these are most rank in his more youth- 
ful rhetorical exercises*, and under the breezier influence of 
practical activity disappeared: at his worst he displays less 
verbosity and meretriciousness than Libanius. In writing he 
had the most astonishing fertility^ coupled with powers of 
expression, of illustration, of humour, and of irony, entitling 
him to take place beside Lucian, and higher than all his imme- 
diate contemporaries. In his writings, considering the occa- 
sions which gave them birth, and remembering that they are 

1 Amm. M. xvi. i. 4. 5, v. 7. Julian's Law Latin, the only surTiving 
remains of his Latin work, is by no means bad. ' Forcible and elaborate, 
though much less pure than his Greek' is La Bleterie's judgment, who 
quotes his funeral decree as a sample. Eutrop. x. 16 is somewhat depre- 
ciatory. 

- Buncombe, i. p. 187 n., quotes La Bleterie's note on the Caesars, 'It 
is plain Juhan had read the Epistles of Cicero to Atticus.' Naville, p. 14, 
evidently doubts his acquaintance with Latin literature. 

3 So expressly La Bleterie, Gibbon, De Broglie iv. p. 24, Na\dlle p. 11, 
Miicke p. 152, &c., and, no doubt with less sincerity, Libanius himself in 
Ep. 372. Spanheim ranks him in literary power above all imperial 
predecessors. 

^ Especially his three panegyrics on Constantius and Eusebia, and a 
few letters, e.g. Epp. 19, 54, and par excellence Ep. 24. In the Ep. ad Ath. — 
a fair enough field for pedantry — there is not one quotation. 

5 For instance. Or. iv. (37 pages in Hertlein) was written in three 
evenings (157 c). Or. v. (27 pages) in part of one night without previous 
preparation (178 d), Or. vi. (80 pages) in the leisure mornents of two occupied 
days (203 c). 



HELLENISM. 243 

the products for the most part of sleepless nights snatched 
from the midst of a life of restless and incessant activities, we 
are amazed at the retentiveness of memory, the rapidity of 
composition, the fecundity of allusion with which they bristle 
at every page. 

All this literary fervour was enlisted on the side of Pa- Hellenism. 
ganism. Hellenism was the name he gave to Paganism. It 
appeared to him inseparably bound up with old Greek form 
of belief^ : it was the fruit or the flower which would inevit- 
ably perish if the roots were exposed or even seriously dis- 
turbed. Julian did his utmost to encourage the Sophists ^ 
because he regarded them as the exponents and representa- 
tives of Hellenic education. And this^ the study of the great 
poets and historians and orators of Greece, he believed to be 
the sole mental discipline which could induce virtuous and 
intelligent habits of mind, and achieve the intellectual regene- 
ration of his fellow-men. Piety and Greek culture he regarded 
as synonymous. Mingling with the literary value that he 
attached to Paganism was its 'philosophical importance. PMloso- 
Neo-Platonism as a philosophic system claimed to unravel ^*^" 
the difficulties of life and belief: and Julian accepted it as 
the most satisfactory solution of the mysteries of existence. 
It taught him, writes Libanius* in his account of Julian's con- 
version, the nature of the soul, its origin and destiny, the 
means by which it is humbled and abased, or exalted and 
lifted up, the meaning of spiritual bondage and spiritual 
liberty, with the way to escape the one and attain the other. 
It initiated him into the love of gods and dasmons. This same 
philosophy, while definitely supporting Paganism, inferred 

^ irpbs TT]v Ti/JL^T' Tuv Oeuv utt' avTwv iKivqd7)s T(2v Xoywf Liban. Prospli. 
I. p. 405. Cf. oiKela Kal avyyevr} ravra d/j.(p6Tepa, hpcL Kal '\dyoi in the Ilpbs 
ToifS els Trjv iraid. &e. , ill. p. 437; and vo/jlI^uiv d8e\<pd Xoyovs re Kal deQv 
lepd Epit. p. 574, c. 77. 

2 Lib. Epit. p. 574, 575. 

3 This idea pervades the rescript on Education translated supr. p. 207 — 9. 
Cf. Ep. 51. 433 D. For reiterated insistence on culture, and more par- 
ticularly Greek culture, as a ' Pagan Evidence,' cf. Cyril, 176 b c, 178 b c, 
184 B, 221 E, 224 c, 229 c— 230 a, 235 c. 

•1 Epitaph, p. 528. 

16—2 



244 JULIAN. 

from its existence and its diversities an underlying unity. 
The outward differences of expression were to the Neo-Pla- 
tonist only less important than the hidden unity on which 
cyr. 115 D- they were based. Special characteristics of belief, worship, 
143 B.' ' morals, are permanently fixed in nations, ingrained in their 
mental or moral structure. They are not random or evanes- 
cent: they correspond to archetypal ideas. They are due to 
the action of the deities of polytheism, whose existence is 
inferred and demonstrated by precisely the same line of 
argument as that which led Plato to his Ideal theoryV Thus 
Neo-Platonism and polytheism each leant upon the other, 
and it is not wonderful that Julian identified philosophy and 
Or. 6. 183 a, religiou. Knowledge of the Gods and similitude to the Gods 
Or. 7.225 D Were his favourite definitions of j)hilosophy. He was the 
best philosopher who most approximated to their likeness. 
'Julian believed that science and religion were sisters'^.' He 
was at great pains, and indeed would strain all historical 
evidence, to show that all the great philosophers were devout 
Pagans too^. Philosophy, and as associated with it Paganism, 
had proved to himself a purifying and expanding power, and 
he believed it would prove the same to others. He was in 
no small measure the victim of delusion. The earlier phases 
of his acquaintance with Pagan philosophers need not here be 
retraced. Friendless and forlorn he had found in 'them guides, 
teachers, admirers, and, what he most needed, sympathising 
friends. Intellectually Julian was a born hero-worshipper. 
With all his quickness and vivacity, he fell short in genuine 
original power. He became a child in the hands of men by 
no means his superiors in mental calibre. His exaggerated 
admiration of Maximus, the fulsome effusiveness of his com- 
pliments to lamblichus pass from the sublime to the ridicu- 
lous. They betray a certain shallowness of judgment, and 
amount to almost an hallucination. In broad and hyperbolic 
expressions of regard Julian's breadth of reading and fertility 
of imagination enabled him to outmatch his contemporaries. 

1 Cf. NaTille, p. 71. 

" Liban. Epit. i. p. 574, aud Upbs roi/s eU r-^v irat5. avrbv dirocTK. ill. p. 437, 

3 Naville, pp. 26, 27, notices this. 



HELLENISM. 245 

To the ancient Maximus he writes with the ardour of some 
youthful lover. His letters he places under his pillow as a 
healing charm on which his head may rest; only by virtue of ^•p. 15. 
them in the absence of the author can he be said truly to 
live. When Maximus^ arrived at court, no sooner was he 
announced than Julian left the throne of judgment; and 
passing down the hall publicly embraced and kissed the phi- 
losopher, to the mixed amusement and contempt of the 
assembled court. Not only is lamblichus^ a second Plato; sp. 59, 53. 
not only are his letters the swallows of spring, and the har- 
bingers of calm, but he himself, considering Julian's own 
religious creed, is almost blasphemously styled a Helios, f''-^5-*J,^^= 
shedding abroad on earth pure rays of celestial light, an ^q\-^'^- ^^* 
^'Esculapius of reasoning souls, in whose absence the Emperor 
is wrapped in Cimmerian darkness, and consumed with a Ep. ss. 439 c 
fever of desire. When he lay ill the letters of lamblichus Ep. eo 
could recover him from sickness, nor could he peruse their 
contents till he had covered with kisses the envelope that 
brought them, and feasted his eyes and lips on the seal which 
the philosopher's own hand had stamped^. Here again is a 
sample letter to Libanius, extracted in full. 

' Yesterday I read your essay almost through before break- Ep. 14. 
fast; and after breakfast without a moment's rest completed the 
reading. Happy art thou who canst so indite, nay happy rather 
who canst so think. What language ! what wit ! what combina- 
tion ! what discrimination ! what treatment ! what arrangement ! 
what periods ! what language ! what harmony ! what a tout 
ensemble^!' 

Such excessive adulation betrays a weakness of tempera- 
ment, which fatally crippled Julian's independence of judg- 
ment. In sending a composition of his own to Maximus, 
Julian compares himself to the eagle that teaches her un- Ep. m 

1 Amm. M. xxii. vii. 3, Liban. Epit. p. 574, Eunap. Vit. Max. 

2 And this be it remembered not the well-known Neo-Platonist philoso- 
pher, but a younger lamblichus, contemporary with Julian himself. Some 
historians treat all the correspondence with lamblichus as supposititious. 

3 Semisch, p. 13, finds truly affecting what to many wiU seem maudlin, 

* For the same tone the close of Ep. 44 may be compared, but it is 
rejected by various editors as spurious. 



overrates 
Hellenism 



246 JULIAN. 

fledged young to face the sun's full beams, and still more 
submissively to the Celtic mother who delivers her babes to 
the mercy of the Rhine to prove whether they be bastards or 
no. K word from Maximus should be the verdict of death. 
Thus Julian committed his intellectual belief, bound hand 
and foot, into the keeping of others. Excusably if errone- 
ously he made up his mind on the merits of Christianity and 
Paganism in the favour of the latter. The misfortune was 
that he never reconsidered his decision when longer thought 
and broader experience might have enabled him to rectify it. 
Once made he laid it on the shelf; he accepted the teaching 
of others, and when come to man's estate, in reality never 
scrutinised its real value. 
Julian The fact is that in his estimate both of contemporary 

Hellenism and of Neo-Platonism Julian went wofully astray. 
There was no germ of recreative life in the Hellenic culture 
which Julian so admired and strove to foster. Already its 
cheek was hectic with approaching death. The arts and 
skill — such as they were — which it most boasted, were symp- 
toms of mortification. Already in the schools the sophist 
and the rhetorician had dispossessed the philosopher^ : in other 
words form had superseded substance; the health of the body 
was neglected, nay forgotten, for the cut of the figure and the 
beautification of the clothes: the day of doom was very close. 
Julian lived during the short breathing-space which was 
granted to the Sophists before they too made their bow, and 
were hissed off the stage. The schools of Rhetoric were de- 
caying fast : enervation of moral teaching and laxity of disci- 
pline were undermining the whole system of education ^ 
Men were already turning from the polished periods and 
complacent pedantry of Athens and Antioch to the rising 
law schools of Rome and Berytus^. Libanius and other 
neglected favourites were already beginning to bemoan the 
wane of enthusiasm, the deterioration of intellectual earn- 
estness and power, the increase of fastidiousness and the 



1 Cf. Capes, University Life at Ancient Athens, p. 52. 

2 lb. p. 90. =* lb. p. 129. 



HELLENISM. 247 

decrease of students ^. Himerius, the last of the great holders 
of the chair of Rhetoric at Athens, died within five years of 
Julian himself Void of its old strength but maintaining 
all its old pretensions, 'Hellenism headed by an Emperor 
was matched against Christianity unsupported by the state, 
but with the blood of martyrs in her veins, and truth for 
standard-bearer ^' And if Julian misread the immediate future 
in store for Hellenic culture, still more was he at fault in the 
necessary connexion that he assumed between it and Pagan- 
ism. The truth was that there was no chance for Hellenic 
culture, unless it were divorced from Paganism and married 
to the religion of Christ. For that the times were not yet 
ripe; but Julian only necessitated and precipitated its ex- 
tinction by widening the existing breach, and doing his 
utmost to make the union impossible. 

Nor was Julian less hopelessly mistaken in his estimate and Neo- 
of Neo-Platonism. There is more excuse for him here; for **<'"''^®'"'- 
it undeniably was the best and greatest, because the only 
philosophy of his day. It had too the merit of being in pos- 
session. Still he vastly overrated its achievements. A little 
more penetration might have placed Julian nearer the level 
of the modern student. It did not require fifteen centuries 
to prove that lamblichus was something lower than Plato, 
any more than that Libanius did not cast Demosthenes alto- 
gether into the shade. It was true that some brilliant lights 
and hues hovered around the sunset of Greek philosophy''; 
but when Julian mistook the evening glow for the fresh 
radiance of morning he made a gigantic mistake. The last 
of the great Neo-Platonists had lived and died before Julian 
ascended the throne ; the Neo-Platonists of his own day were 
none of them gifted with genius, and most of them were 
credulous and dissembling charlatans. From lamblichus 
onwards philosophy was posting to ruin and self-annihilation: 
it was yet to boast a Proclus and an Hypatia : but its age- 

1 Capes, p. Ill, 112, 123. ^ Mangold, p. 26. 

3 Not a few, like Schlosser in Jenaisch. allg. Lit. p. 131, will not allow so 
much as this : to him the Sophists have nothing of value but the precious 
remnants botched into their patchwork. 



248 JULIAN. 

long decrepitude had begun, the protracted enfeeblement 
which waited two hundred years* for the fiat of destruction 
to fall, when the sorry remnant, 'the last Seven Sages of 
Greece,' turned their backs, on Athens and crept away east- 
ward, vainly hoping to find in heathen Persia a respect which 
Christian Europe had refused. All this was dark to Julian ; 
a fundamental error beset his whole mental constitution, a 
fatal transposition of actual truth, which led him to miscal- 
culate all the forces at work around him. Among dying 
embers he watched and wondered at the lingering sparks; 
they gained a brightness from the growing darkness, but 
they could not light up the old fires that had smouldered out^ 
Julian's But Julian found subsidiary evidences of Paganism be- 

7f Pagan- ^ides those of a literary and philosophical character. It is 
ism. beyond question that he looked upon the truth and laws of 

Theurgy, theurgic art as scientifically demonstrable, and their validity 
as proved by the experience of generations of men. From 
cyr. 346-7, the history of Cain and Abel, from the usase of Abraham 

35(5—358. .... 

downwards, divination, rightly conducted, had received the 

approval and unmistakably revealed the will of the Deity. 

Historical Apart from this mysterious lore, a crowd of historical evi- 

■ dences attested the truth of Paganism. Some were of a 

material kind: witness the heaven-descended An ciUa! Some 

i9i c prophetic : witness the inspired predictions of the Sybil ! 

194b Some personal: witness the wisdom of virtuous legislators of 

141 D, 168 B, the past, of Lykurgus, of Solon, of Numa 'the most wise'! 

Some national: witness Greece! witness Rome! Last link in 

this long chain of historical evidences stood Julian himself. 

For he, like his supporters, appealed to his own career as 

most decisive testimony to the power and interference of the 

Gods. . It was as their .champion that he had been delivered 

in childhood from the murderer, guarded and guided and 

promoted in youth, and in the prime of his days set without 

a struggle sole on the seat of Empire, 

It must seem strange at first sight that Julian should 

^ Justinian's edict for closing the schools of Athens, issued 529 A. d. 
^ Cf. words much to the point in Miicke, Jul. Leben und Schriften, 
pp. 71, 72. 



HELLENISM. 249 

have appealed with the persistency he does to historical evi- 
dences of Paganism. How, it will be said, could Paganism 
have historical evidences to allege? It was well enough for 
Christianity born in obscurity and only struggling by hard- 
won inches to toleration and pre-eminence to claim on its 
side the verdict of history: but Paganism was never pitted 
against a rival: in various shapes it parted out the whole 
world; Paganism triumphant was but the reverse side of 
Paganism overcome: one element dispossessed another, and 
that was all. The answer to this is, what must be once more 
reaffirmed, that to Julian Paganism was Hellenism. And 
this Julian conceived to have everywhere prevailed. It had 
moulded, trained and immortalised Greece: it had subjugated 
the East: it had taken captive Rome its conqueror; it had 
now learned how to combine in a connected whole the religions 
of the world. It had one last foe to conquer, Galileism, and 
would then take its rightful sceptre of universal sovereignty. 
In this estimate Julian had some facts to bear him out; 
others he imported into history. Hellenic colonies he argued or. 4. 152 d 
had civilised the world, and prepared it for obedience to 
Home : Rome was Hellenic in origin, Hellenic in rites, and caes. zu &. 
Hellenic in faith. Romulus was sprung of Ares, Numa re- or. 4. 154, 
ceived his revelations from Sun direct, Caesar could trace 
descent to ^neas son of Aphrodite. 

On the same side, and bound up with these historical Gonserva- 
beliefs, were enlisted all Julian's conservative instincts. These 
were necessarily strong. The greatness of Rome was in the 
past: her choicest rulers he could aspire only to imitate not 
to surpass. Marcus Aurelius' as virtuous ruler, Trajan as 
military leader, he could not scale sublimer heights. His 
policy and the entire movement which he headed were reac- 
tionary. The 'dear dead light' was that to which he looked 
back, that which he strove to rekindle. He was in one word 
a Romanticist^. He undertook conservation and reconstruc- 

1 Amm. M. xvi. i. 4, as well as Jul. ad Them. 253 a, and many passages 
in the Caesares. 

2 'The Komanticist,' to borrow the Edinburgh Bevieio paraphrase of 
Strauss' explanation of his term, ' is one who, in literature, in the arts, in 



250 JULIAN. 

tion, but not origination. Return seemed to him the sole 
salvation. This was true of religion above all else. 'Innova- 
Ep. 03. 453 B tion I shun in all things, most of all in what concerns the 
Gods,' is his own declaration. The prime impulsive or sub- 
versive forces of his time were the Christians and the bar- 
barians. Julian's public life was one sustained struggle 
against these two. One threatened the outward, the other 
the inward unity of the Empire. The Christians were the 
Bp. 25.397 b 'spiritual barbarians' of the day. Their innovating, progress- 
cyr. 238, ivo, revolutionary character was in Julian's estimation one of 
their most flagrant demerits. In his eyes nothing was more 
heinous than abandonment of traditional law. Observance of 
law was by his teaching a part of religion. It had a positive 
religious as well as moral significance. Each national differ- 
ence and peculiarity, laws, morals, customs, and rites alike, 
were characters impressed by the presiding deity, and the 
dereliction of any one of these was rebellion and apostasy from 
revealed truth. 
Julian Such then were the principal grounds on which Julian 

moral based his enthusiastic devotion to Hellenism. Living in 

jmver of immediate contact, and for the most part in personal in- 
Fagamsm. . -^i-n n -i • 

tercourse with the most gifted Pagans of his day, it was 

intelligible and perhaps natural that Julian should exag- 
gerate the intellectual merits of Neo-Platonism and expiring 
Hellenism. His deductions even from its past history 
are explicable enough, illogical as they may appear from a 
modern standpoint. That he should have so completely 

religion, or in politics, endeaYOurs to revive the dead past ; one who refuses 
to accept the fiat of history ; refuses to acknowledge that the past is past, 
that it has grown old and obsolete ; one who regards the present age as in 
a state of chronic malady, curable only by a reproduction of some distant 
age, of which the present is not the child, but the abortion. Poets who see 
poetry only in the Middle Ages, who look upon fairy tales and legends as 
treasures of the deepest wisdom ; painters, who can see nothing pictorial in 
the world around them ; theologians, who see no faith equal to the deep 
reverence of saint-worship, who see no recognition of the Unspeakable 
except in superstition, who acknowledge no form of worship but the cere- 
monies of the early church ; politicians, who would bring back " merrie 
England " into om- own sad times by means of ancient pastimes and white 
waistcoats : — these are all Bomanticists.' 



HELLENISM. 251 

misapprehended its moral powers is far more amazing. He 
did go so far as to recognise some at least of its actual 
moral deficiencies; he allowed for instance that the Jews cyr. 202. 
exhibited superior purity and religious scrupulousness; but 
the wonderful thing is that he should have supposed Pagan- 
ism capable of reform; that he should have attributed so 
much potential energy and recuperative power to a system 
which really possessed none. It has been paradoxically de- 
clared Hhat no Pagan would conceive of reforming Paganism; 
and if reformation be limited to its strict sense of correction 
of supervenient abuses and return to some primitive uncon- 
taminated model, the remark is strictly true. There was no 
model, neither personal exemplar nor authoritative tradition, 
to which to return. Paganism might be amended, it could 
not be reformed. Neither would it admit of the transforma- 
tion to which Julian endeavoured to subject it. It may have 
been one weakness of the scheme that the welfare, nay exist- 
ence of the religious organisation was inseparable from that 
of the empire^, but assuredly it showed other and more fatal 
flaws. We have seen the kind of revival contemplated, the 
creation, namely, of a Pagan Church Catholic. The notion 
originated with the Neo-Platonists. It was a stupendous 
folly. If it needed a clever man to frame the conception, a 
far duller one might have recognised the utter impracticabi- 
lity of carrying it into effect. None but a pedant could have 
supposed the strange jumble of poetry, philosophy, mysticism 
and witchcraft which commended itself to Julian, a religion 
capable of being popularized'. Still 'it laid hold on the minds 
of the Hellenist philosophers of the day with a strange fasci- 
nation.' It was perhaps worth while that once for all the 
feasibility of the attempt should be disproved to demonstration. 

To summarise once more results already attained, Julian, Julian's 
following the general Neo-Platonist rebound from the scepti- tionl^'^' 
cal materialism that preceded it, assumed the religious in- 

1 Beugnot, p. 199. 

2 Lam^, Julian VApost. caps. 11. and vi., pp. 123, 124, treats this as tTte one 
fatal weakness. 

3 Schlosser, Uebersicht der Gesch. iii. ii. pp. 342, 408. 



252 JULIAN. 

stinct; asserted in unqualified terms man's intuitive appre- 
hension of God; recognised in religion the support of morality, 
the sustainer of law, the author and preserver of Hellenic 
culture. The truth of Paganism as against Christianity was 
substantiated by its antiquity and universality as witnessed 
by the scattered but confluent testimonies of the various 
nations of mankind; by the historical success which had 
attended the propagation of the religions of Greece and 
Rome ; by the evidences of prophecy and divination ; by 
visible tokens of the Gods' presence among men ; last and 
most chiefly by the full ripe clusters of poetry and philosophy 
that graced the old religion. Keenly alive to the imper- 
fections of contemporary Paganism Julian strove to eradicate 
them. Looking around him and taking note of the rapid 
growth and prevalence of Christianity he proceeded to emend 
Pasfanism on that model. He has been called 'the ape of 
Christianity.' Gregory of Nazianzus elaborates his metaphor 
at length. Impressed with the belief that Christianity was a 
mere scheme, and blind to, the genuine enthusiasm that 
animated it, Julian fancied that Paganism had merely doceri 
ah hoste, to learn from its worst enemy, to adopt its tactics, 
to follow its example in some details, and that forthwith it 
would step into its place and everywhere supplant its in- 
fluence. The first thing necessary was a purified morality ; 
the second an organised church. To these ends the ' Luther 
of Paganism'^ constantly strove. He introduced an elaborate 
sacerdotal system. The practices of sacred reading, preach- 
ing, praying, antiphonal singing, penance, and a strict eccle- 
siastical discipline^ were all innovations in Pagan ritual. 
Added to these was a system of organised almsgiving, to 
which Julian attributed so much of the success of Christianity; 
with the proceeds temples might be restored, the poor suc- 
coured, the sick and destitute relieved. Nay if Gregory's 
words are more than rhetoric, even monasteries and nun- 
neries, refuges and hospitals were reared in the name of 
Paganism. 
itsfu- But attempts like these necessarily and irremediably 

1 Cliateaubr. Etud. Hist. ii. 107. ' Greg. Naz. Or. iv. cxi. p. 648. 



HELLENISM. 253 

failed. The alms which were to be the panacea for infidelity ^^'^^ ^p- 
were not forthcoming. Julian spared neither private purse 
nor public funds, but though he might rebuild temples he 
could not provide a congregation. State endowment never 
yet created spiritual life. It was a more hopeless attempt 
than a restoration of medieval monasticism in the nineteenth 
century \ The real fact was that every element of per- 
manent vitality was hopelessly wanting to this revival. It 
may have been the last resort of both Neo-Platonism and 
Paganism : if so, it was the knell of both. A Pagan Catholic 
Church was a contradiction in terms. For first a visible 
unity was absolutely impossible. For convenience sake Pa- 
ganism has been treated as a system ; and as though it formed 
a compact whole : and for certain purposes such language 
is perfectly legitimate. It is convenient to group the Oppo- 
sition in Parliament as a single party ; to class Dissenters as 
a common society. But regarded in their positive and proper 
selves, both split into numberless divisions, possessed of no 
common principle save that of joint antagonism to a common 
foe. Far more is this the case with Paganism. Its name 
was legion. There was no pretence in it of unity. Nay its 
whole strength lay in disunion. It . possessed not a single 
element of cohesion. No common parent, no primitive stock : 
no authoritative sanction, no common creed, no symbol of 
faith, not even a common God. It was simply a conglomera- 
tion of fragments, that had neither natural afiinity nor 
artificial connexion. To proclaim the oneness of these, to 
rally them into a single whole, was wantonly to make a 
decisive blow possible. Paganism might perhaps for long 
wage a successful guerilla warfare with Christianity, now 
advancing, now receding, cutting off troops here or supplies 
there, but to meet it in the open field was to court defeat. 

And if the want of unity in Paganism made catholicity 
unattainable, sacerdotalism became by virtue of that fact 
an impossibility. Julian might frame rules and spin theories, 
but a sacerdotal system devoid of all basis except arbitrary 
state enactment was the baldest folly. To have conceived 
1 Schlosser, Uebers. der Gesch. iii. ii. p. 411. 



254 JULIAN. 

the possibility of realising sucli does small credit to Julian's 
sagacity. The essence of sacerdotalism consists in the pos- 
session of certain mystical and transmitted, and it may 
perhaps be added inalienable, powers. To such Julian's 
priests could not make pretence. By simplest Pagan use a 
citizen was made priest in the same fashion as he was made 
magistrate : it was an affair of election ; and his teuure and 
terms of oflfice were similarly regulated. A man became 
priest for one festival, for one day, or for one year, as utility 
demanded. The idea of such a priesthood could not of a 
sudden be revolutionised to order. It is true that under 
most if not all forms of mystery- worship, priests became a 
trained and consecrated caste. But even such a priesthood 
could only base its prerogative on very arbitrary and un- 
defined claims, while between the various priest-castes there 
was not only no realised unity, but not even a potential 
bond of connexion. What theory was there or could there 
be in Paganism analogous to that of Apostolic transmission ? 
What power of absolution, or ordination or administration of 
holy mysteries was vested in their hands ? and by what 
virtue ? or by whose warrant ? from whence derived ? Their 
office was a mere caricature of the Christian priesthood. 
Their services and prayers were but mumming ritual. Their 
initiations and their sacrifices unmeaning parodies, or unholy 
sorceries, fit only to tickle the foolish or awe the superstitious. 
When Felix ^ the youthful martyr of Abitina, having con- 
fessed himself a Christian, was asked whether he had at- 
tended meetings, he replied with an explosion of scorn, 'As 
if a Christian could live without the Lord's ordinance ! 
Knowest thou not, Satan, that the Christian's whole being is 
in the sacrament 1' The very thought was unintelligible to 
a Pagan worshipper. Just as in the past there was neither 
bond of union nor historical foundation, so in the present 
there was no active spiritual fellowship with believers or 
with God, no feeding on a present Saviour and no com- 
munion with the saints. 

1 The incident belongs to tlie time of Diocletian. Mason, Persecution of 
Diocletian, p. 157. 



HELLENISM. 255 

Turn we to morality, and the case stands hardly any Paganism 
better. The Paganism of Julian's time was incurably cor- 
rupt \ It was immoral to the core. Many sanctuaries ex- 
isted as dens of debauchery. Prostitutes were priestesses, 
and temple was cant name for brothel. The essence of wor- 
ship was the satisfaction of lust^ When on days of high 
festival Julian royally attired passed through the streets of 
Constantinople to solemn celebration of the feast, it was no 
decorous procession of venerable priests or modest virgins 
that followed in his steps : around the chaste grave young 
Emperor thronged a drunken rout^ : among those that bore 
the insignia of sacerdotal pomp were mutilated priests of 
Cybele, priestess-courtesans of Venus, immodest screaming 
bacchants catching the public gaze by their obscene cries and 
antics. And this immorality was not only on the surface, or 
confined to certain public resorts. It was far more than 
skin-deep. It pervaded and poisoned the very springs of 
home life : it violated the sanctity of the domestic hearth. 
It cannot be grossly unfair to select the darling festival of 
Antioch as in some measure typical of eastern Paganism. 
This was the so-called Maiuma feast. Julian* takes the 
dissolute townspeople to task for the vast sums they lavished 
on carouses during its celebration. Nominally it was a religious 
festival. What then was 'its character? In the great am- 
phitheatre, in an open reservoir filled with water, the com- 
mon women of the town swam and gambolled in public. A 
resident at Antioch, and no less firm a Pagan than Libanius, 
declares that the essence of the Maiuma was ' not to abstain 
from any kind of abomination.' It remains one proof of 
Julian's weakness that he had to license this annual degra- 
dation, which his predecessor had suppressed. There was 
not wanting a moral element among Pagans ; but it was too . 
feeble to protest. Even when it found a voice, it had nothing 

1 Compare De Broglie, L'Eglise, iv. p. 151. 

2 Julian's fifty-eightli letter gives some hint of the form of ' adoration ' in 
vogue about the obelisk of Alexandria. 

3 Amm. M. xxii. xii. 6, Eunap. Vit. Max., Chrys. in lul. et Gent. n. 
pp. 667, 668. 

* Mis. 362 D, cf. La Bleterie's note in loc. Also Chastel, p. 213 n. 



25G JTTLIAN. 

much to say. The Neo-Platonists, as moral or religious 
philosophers, were practically a close sect. They did not 
aspire to moral propagandism. Their creed was a hothouse 
plant. The leading sophists did indeed undertake to ex- 
pound ethics ; it was one of their main pretensions, no less 
than of the older sophists, to teach young men virtue. Each 
had his clientele of students, for whose conduct he accounted 
himself responsible hardly less than for their intellectual 
training. But the moral hold of the sophists was steadily 
relaxing ; their utterances are burdened with regrets and 
complaints anent the decay of discipline. It was no wonder. 
Their lectures were no better than dull sermons. 'As preachers 
of righteousness the schoolmen were easily surpassed by the 
great doctors of the church, who like themselves had mastered 
all the rules of rhetoric and used them in a nobler cause \' 
They were not like their great predecessors, men of daring 
and incisive intellect, the free-thinkers of Greece exposing 
conventional untruth, and excogitating doctrines destined to 
revolutionise or rather recreate ethics. These wrangling 
Diadochi could but hark back with stale iterations and 
vapid moralising to lifeless or exploded theories, and bring 
to disrepute the world-renowned forces which had given them 
birth. 
Paganism Again, Paganism was in matter of religion immovably 
callous. callous. There are times when the most odious moral cor- 
ruption coexists with fanatical religious fervour. But this 
was not the case with the Pagans of Julian's day. Among 
them religious indifference reigned supreme. Where Pa- 
ganism retained an outward ascendancy, where, as at Rome, 
the aristocracy of wealth and fashion remained adherents 
of the old cults, it had lulled itself into the most complete 
nonchalance of fancied security. There is no attempt at 
self-defence, much less at missionary vigour. No Pagan 
priest^ comes forward as an apologist for his faith ; there too 

1 Capes, Univ. Life in Anc. Athens, p. 90, an interesting sketch to which 
I owe much at this point. Cf. Chastel, 343 pp. 

2 The dialogue Philopatris forms at best a very unimportant exception, 
if it is to be excepted at all. For the statement in the text Neander, Church 
History iii. p. 112—124, may be compared. 



HELLENISM. 257 

Julian must in person and alone bear the brunt of the fray. 
With a comatose inactivity Paganism accepted or adopted a 
policy of absolute and culpable laissez-faire. It was in its 
dotage and simply asked to be let alone to its torpor and 
imbecility and folding of the hands in sleep. The Pagans 
themselves only laughed at Julian's zeal, or stared at it in 
dull undisguised amazement : then after the first moment of 
amused surprise yawned themselves to sleep again. It was 
the same among the educated and the uneducated, among 
the rich as among the poor. Julian alone was impervious to 
the comic aspect of his proceedings, and his gravity heightened 
the joke. The Sophists no doubt as a body warmly sup- 
ported him ; for while Constantius had treated them with 
marked coolness and ousted them from court, Julian had 
restored to them more than their previous privileges. But 
their support was strictly limited to the sphere of self-interest, 
and guaranteed no devotion or self-sacrifice. Basking in 
court sunshine, they sponged upon their patron's liberality \ 
but were mere spectators of his attempt to reanimate religion. 
Many were time-servers not at all anxious to commit them- 
selves too deeply against the Christians. Some, like Chry- 
santhius and Aristomenes, and perhaps too Libanius, were so 
incredulous of Julian's success, as actually to shrink from 
appearing at court at all. That however was a refinement of 
prudence discarded by most. As a body the Sophists were 
only too glad to sip the sweets of power while the sun 
shone. They even urged the reformer to steps against 
which his own sense of justice revolted. They welcomed 
the triumph of Hellenism, but in their own person would face 
no risk nor privation to promote it. They applauded the 
combatants and egged them on, but did not come down into 
the arena. Indeed throughout the correspondence and 
speeches of Sophists contemporary with Julian, few features 
are more marked than their pervading religious indiffer- 
entism. Such indifferentism was in point of fact inevitable : 
and for this reason, that there was no essential antagon- 
ism between Hellenism and Christianity. When Paganism 
1 Cf. supr. p. 155—6, and also Liban. Ep. 372. 
R. E. 17 



258 JULIAN. 

became Hellenism the essential hostility between it and 
Christianity ceased. And it was of Hellenism, of intellectual 
culture that is to say and not of moral or theological beliefs, 
that the Soj)hists were apostles. Gregory and Basil were 
firm Christians, as students at Athens : Libanius numbered 
among his pupils Theodore of Mopsuestia, Maximus Bishop of 
Seleucia and John Chrysostom himself \ The same in- 
differentism (which appears a juster term than tolerance) 
was not confined to the great educators, but affected the 
cultured classes at large. To quote one palmary instance: — 
the great historian of Julian's age was Ammianus Marcellinus: 
he was soldier and officer of state as well as student : not- 
withstanding the unusually full materials for judgment that 
he left behind him, there are still students and readers of 
his works who remain unsatisfied that he was a Pagan. 
Neither he nor any other profane historian has thought it 
worth while to record the exact time or circumstances of 
Julian's profession of apostasy. As with the higher classes 
so was it with the lower, save that the latter showed a little 
more of boorish curiosity. The rich spectacles provided for 
their edification soon lost the charm of novelty ; if they at- 
tended the temple at all, it was with the object of securing a 
good view of the lord of the world, and enjoying the un- 
wonted spectacle of an emperor butchering beasts, handling 
entrails, or distending his cheeks to kindle the altar-fire ^ 
Again and again does Julian reiterate the complaint that 
people came to the temples to see him, not to do worship to 
the Gods. Even when the outward show was unimpeach- 
able, when in externals decorousness and zeal were every- 

Ep. 27. 400. where apparent, Julian at last could not resist the suspicion 
that it was due solely to a desire to win his approbation and 
with it some substantial reward. 

Paganism If Paganism was languid where as at Rome it was in the 
ascendant, it was not less so where it with difficulty held its 

1 Soli. VI. 3, Soz. viii. 2. The latter, but for his religion, he would have 
selected as his successor. Chastel, 344 pp., gives a good selection of extracts 
showing the intimate relations maintained between the leaders of Christian 
and Pagan education. 

2 Liban. Ad lul. Hyp. p. 394, 395. 



HELLENISM. 259 

own. Aiitiocli was a metropolis of the East : it was fourth 
city in the Empire, third patriarchate in the Church ; in- 
cluding native Syrians, Greek colonists, and Roman officials, 
it had a large Pagan population, and party-spirit was brisk. 
The first sound (it had been noted as of ominous significance) 
that fell upon the Emperor's ear, as he approached the town, 
was the wild summer wailing for the lost Adonis. Adonis 
was indeed dead and his fellows ! In spite of all Julian's efforts 
and exhortation, in spite of his own devotion, in spite of his 
restoration of Apollo's shrine at Daphne, when he came to cele- 
brate with renovated pomp the annual festival of the town's 
patron deity, the sole representative of all the wealth and 
prosperity of that great city was a single priest with a solitary Mis. 362. 
goose, who could scarcely prevail on his own son to serve 
him as acolyte. No wonder that Julian turned away sick at 
heart, to vent his spleen in indignant objurgations to the 
council. But it was everywhere the same. 'Everywhere,' 
says Libanius^, 'were altars and fires and blood and fat of 
sacrifice and smoke and sacred rites, and diviners fearlessly 
performing their functions. And on the mountain-tops were 
pipings and processions, and the sacrificial ox, which was at 
once an offering to the Gods and a banquet to men.' Ah yes, 
everywhere were these things, but where were the genuine 
worshippers, who could make them all significant ? 

Paganism was thus profoundly indifferent, because it was Frivolity 
not only hopelessly and mortally corrupt, but also because it js^_ 
was yet more hopelessly and recklessly frivolous. There was 
probably less of flagrant wickedness at Rome than at the 
time when in the words of her great historian the imperial 
city was 'the common sink and rendezvous of every atrocity 
and abomination^.' But it will be worth while to scan 
the somewhat less dark portraiture^ of a later age, and see 
reflected in the microcosm of Rome the outward spirit of 
the age of Julian. The trials of infancy, the stalwart pride 

1 Liban. Epitaph, i. p.' 564. 
' Tac. Ann. xv. 44. 

^ As rendered by Amm. Marc. xiv. 6, of which the following lines are 
a close paraphrase, almost deserving inverted commas. 

. 17—2 



260 JULIAN. 

of youth, the strength of maturity, the venerable tranquillity 
of a green old age were all past. It was the acme of genius 
now to invent a more stylish phaeton, a daintier fringe, or a 
more transparent gossamer stuff. The rich man rattled 
along the basalt-paved streets at the head of a miniature 
army ; not a scullion was left behind : grooms and lacqueys 
led the van : grimy cooks and hired loungers filled the ranks, 
while lines of sallow and ill-favoured eunuchs brought up 
the rear : in every direction troops of ballet-girls with wanton 
ringlets tripped or waltzed along the pavements, showing 
their ancles in true theatrical fashion. Meanwhile the libra- 
ries were deserted as graveyards. The philosopher's chair 
was taken by the choir-master, and professors of broad farce 
filled the ancient seats of professors of rhetoric. While the 
growth of celibacy and rapid physical degeneracy threatened 
to extirpate the higher classes, the lower spent all their 
time, gambling and betting, in low and immoral resorts. 
Turbulence, taverns, and vulgarity according to Ammian 
were the three prominent characteristics of Rome. No 
wonder that in such a society science, poetry and art were 
obsolete. Constantino, master of the resources of the world, 
had not been able to deck his arch of Triumph, except by 
decorations pilfered from his great predecessor's trophy ; 
while all Europe and Asia had to be rifled to supply statues 
for the requirements of the new metropolis that bore its 
founder's name. Poetry had died after the ill treatment 
accorded it by Silius Italicus and succeeding poetasters ; 
Claudian was in his nursery, and the Muses had not yet 
been christened and begun to lisp again in Prudentius\ 
Alike in art, in intellect, and in morals, every spark of 
interest or earnestness had died out at Rome^ She was in 
a state of such hopeless moral debauch that to Ammian^ it 

^ Ausonius I omit, as so very questionable a Christian or poet. The 
expression used of Claudian is not meant to be more than vague, the date 
of his birth being so uncertain. 

* Haec similiaque memorabile nihil vel sejrium agi Eomae permittunt. 
Amm. M. xiv. vi. 26. 

3 Amm. M. xx\nn. iv. 5, a chapter in which the Eome of sixteen years 
later (369 a. d.) is painted in even more sinister colours than above. 



HELLENISM. 261 

seemed that though Epimenides of Crete had risen from the 
dead, he could not have purged her uncleanness. Eehgion, 
morality, law alike pronounced her disease incurable. While 
the plague was upon her, the Imperial city, in thoughtless 
frivolity or giddy intoxication, was dancing her carnival of 
death, till the fierce Visigoth knocked at the gates and burst 
sword in hand upon the awe-struck revellers. 

Rome then, as depicted to us by a contemporary, was a Paganism 
city given over to the pursuit of pleasure, a fourth century ^^-^^ of' 
Paris. Rome too was the acknowledged stronghold of Pa- Pleasure. 
ganism. The coincidence is not fortuitous : between the 
two facts there exists a natural correlation of idea. True that 
Paganism owed something to the legal sanction, the official 
garb in which it walked ; true too that the influence of the 
schools, and the preaching of the Sophists, by no means 
altogether failed in their advocacy of Paganism ; true once 
more that where the instinct of legality failed, or intellectual 
appreciativeness was absent, divination and sorcery, with 
their subtle organisation of mixed terrorism and winning- 
ness, their shrewd frauds of menace or promise or present 
delusion, enchained many victims of superstition; but yet, 
bearing in mind the activity and eflacacy of these varied forces, 
and the yet more degraded allurements by which Paganism 
seduced the affections of its votaries, we may confidently 
affirm that the true basis of Paganism was not law, not culture, 
not superstition, not lust, much less of course religion, but in 
one word pleasure. The maintenance of Paganism was con- 
sciously identified with the maintenance of pleasure, in its 
existing public forms. And if there is one right which a 
corrupt and fallen nation or populace asserts with devoted 
tenacity, it is the right to be amused. It was so with the 
people of Rome. Long after they had surrendered their 
free rights to the minions of emperors, they delighted still to 
call themselves lord in the amphitheatre, to scream for cir- 
censes as vociferously as for panem. Forms of civic election 
were gone through for this end. It was the one duty and 
reward of the elective magistrates to provide their constituents 
with suitable and sufficient amusements. The splendour of 



262 JULIAN. 

the ffames was the measure of liis merit. It has become a 
modern commonplace to oppose the spirit of Hebraism to 
that of Hellenism. The antithesis has been often criticised, 
and may be defective, but if there is one form of Hellenism 
to which more than another so-called Hebraism is antago- 
nistic, it was the popular Hellenism of Julian's own day. It 
was easy-going, giddy, sensual, gregarious. This Hellenism 
Julian tried to Hebraise^ — to make it earnest, grave, chaste, 
self-contained. It declined to 'put on the new man.' It 
was too merry and wayward to attempt any such thing. 
Like Undine, it had not taken a soul — and winced and 
shrank away from the thought of it. Living and letting live, 
it had no heart to be sober or sad. It danced its innocent 
revel or rioted in dissolute delights, or thrilled to weird 
enchantments. From all these Julian thought to wean it. 
It is no marvel that he was left without encouragement and 
without support. The one marvel is that he should have 
attempted at all to spin ropes of this waste sand with no 
better cement than lamblichus' patent. 

Paganism was doomed, and Neo-Platonism could but 
precipitate eventual ruin. The moral sense of mankind had 
revolted long since against the gross conceptions of pristine 
theology. When Neo-Platonism espoused its allegorical 
method of interpretation, it was a confession that no sup- 
porter of Paganism, however ardent, could any longer adhere 
to its doctrines. The new orthodoxy Avas too capricious in 
method, too arbitrary in result, and too devoid of authori- 
tative sanction ever to command assent. The moral re- 
generation of Paganism was in even worse case than the 
intellectual. The local and national and patriotic associa- 
tions, which of old had served Paganism so well, were all 

1 Cf. Miicbe, Julian's Leben uiid Schriften, p. 93. Julian tauschte sich 
niclit bloss iiber die Natur des Christenthums sondern aucli liber die des 
Hellenismus, indem er dieser Keligion, der alles Asketische, alles Entsagen 
imd Verziclaten auf den heitereu Genuss einer schonen Sinneuwelt ganz 
fern lag, christliche Entlialtsamkeit und Demuth, tinunterbrocliene Be- 
kampfung der Sinnlichkeit, Verliiugnung des eigenen Willens und fiigsame 
Unterordming unter ein strenges Sittengesetz zumuthete, das alle Freude 
aus dem menschlichen Dasein auf immer zu verbaunen schien. 



HELLENISM. 263 

stricken with death. Those who needed the consolation of 
religion at all, instinctively felt that that religion must be 
universal not partial, a religion not of clans or peoples, but of 
mankind. Julian and the Neo-Platonists realised the truth ; 
but their misty, impersonal assurances of life to come, their 
'ecstacy' so confined and unattainable, their empty formali- 
ties of worship could in the end satisfy none whom Christi- 
anity failed to allure. 



CHAPTER XL 

VICISTI GALILAEE ! 



Basilius. Here lies a splendid broken tool of God. 

The Empeeor Julian, Act v. H. Ibsen (transl. by C. Eay). 



Estimates There are few principal actors on tlie great world-stage 
of Julian. ^^ whom history has passed more discordant verdicts than on 
Julian. In the case of those few it is generally true either 
that the records of their lives are meagre and conflicting, 
that they lived in a dark age, or else that the very profundity 
of their aims or maybe some inscrutable blending of good 
and evil purposes have wrapped them in impenetrable ob- 
scurity. They have lived and died enigmas which defied the 
skill of the historian to produce an authoritative solution. 
Neither excuse can be pleaded in the instance of Julian. 
Contemporary records are superabundant. Histories, speeches, 
letters alike of friends and enemies, throw on him a glare of 
light from every side. His laws, his written or reported 
orations, his public despatches and private correspondence 
are a body of evidence of the best kind, and of unimpeachable 
veracity. These exhibit Julian as no bewildering oracular 
genius, driven like Mohammed by fitful gusts of inspiration, 
or remorselessly ' ploughing his way ' like Cromwell unscru- 
pulous in his means from intensity of belief in his end, but 
rather as a sincere busy garrulous ruler, whose whole life 
nothing but self-deceiving subtlety could fail to construe 
aright. Prejudice and intense religious bias have certainly 
done their utmost to misstate or misinterpret simple truths. 



VICISTI GALILAEE ! 265 

It would be more amusing than instructive to compare venom 
from Gregory's 'Invective' with flowers from the 'Panegyric' 
of Libanius. It would be easy to quote from writers, whom 
lapse of time might have made impartial, strange contrarieties 
of judgment the fruit of theological prepossessions. But what 
shall we say to more deeply-seated contradictions ? If it is 
explicable that Schlosser^ should detect only the inveterate 
dissembler, where Hase^ discovers next to Athanasius the 
greatest figure of his century, how explain that while the 
most eminent of English Roman Catholics^ allows the Apo- 
state to have been ' all but the pattern man of philosophical 
virtue,' in whom must be recognised 'a specious beauty and 
nobleness of moral deportment which combines in it the 
rude greatness of Fabricius or Hegulus with the accomplish- 
ments of Pliny or Antoninus,' the founder and high priest of 
Positivism has linked his name with Napoleon Buonaparte's 
to denote in the Comtist calendar one day of solemn repro- 
bation*. To have attained this twofold distinction argues 
something remarkable in the man. Nor is it solely modern 
caprice straining after originality, nor any spurious flourish 
of tolerance that has dictated these judgments. It was a 
Christian successor of Julian's, who chose for his epitaph 
Homer's^ tribute to Agamemnon lord of man, 

ajxcfiOTepov, ^aaCKeis t' dyaObs Kparepos t' alxfJ-WV^t 

and well-nigh the earliest of Christian poets to whom Julian 

seemed 

ductor fortissimus armis, 
conditor et legum, celeberrimus ore manuque^. 

At Julian's accession to the throne, for the second time in The com- 
the history of the Roman Empire, Plato's darling wish wasy^^^^^ 

1 Schlosser, Jena. Lit.-Zeit., Jan. 1813, pp. 122 — 135, and Univ. -hist. 
Ueh. der Gesch. der alt. Welt. in. §§ 2, 3. 

2 Kirchengeschichte, p. 124. 

3 J. H. Newman, Idea of a University, p. 194. 

♦ Naville, Jul. VApost. Pref. p. vii. Another writer has already con- 
trasted the pious Gottfried Arnold's doubt 'whether Julian persecuted the 
Christians or the Christians Julian,' with Gibbon's audible undertone of 
depreciation. — Zeitschr. filr wiss. TheoL p. 96. 

* Horn. II III. 179. « Prud. Apoth. 450. 



266 VICISTI GALILAEE ! 

gratified, *a philosopher was made king.' Nor as Emperor 
did he show himself untrue to his professions: he was but too 
eager and proud to carry out his philosopher's convictions, 
little by little approximating Rome to the Ideal State. The 
movement which he headed ought to be one of profound his- 
toric and even dramatic interest. For the last time for more 
than fourteen centuries civilised Europe by state decree pro- 
claimed Christianity a lie, and deified Wisdom in its stead. 
It was the final stand made by Hellenism against its great 
rival. Hellenism was represented at its best, the best at 
any rate of which it was at that age capable; Christianity, 
when the conflict began, in some respects at its worst. It 
had lost its pristine earnestness: it was giddy at its new and 
dangerous elevation: in its new development as connected 
with the state, it was still in infancy; and was suffering from 
all the maladies to which such an infancy was necessarily 
prone : it had not yet had space or experience to learn wisdom; 
nor was its constitution yet formed to natural robustness. 
The combatants then might seem well-matched, the naturally 
weaker having on his side the advantage of age and experi- 
ence and past prestige. There might have been expected a 
struggle of prolonged and thrilling interest, a battle of giants, 
a rocking to and fro of battalions locked in the death-grip as 
on Julian's own field of Strasburg, where the din of fight grew 
ever louder and louder, 'fierce as waves beating upon rocks,' 
where darinsf outdid darins^ and courage rose with failure 
hardly less than with success, and every gap was filled by a 
more impetuous foe^. As a matter of fact the drama pre- 
sented to us is nothing of the kind. It is flat and tame : 
the result is foreseen from the beginninof. There is not even 
incident enough to construct an exciting 23lot to postpone the 
irreversible denouement. There is more sober truth than 
usual in Gregory's declamation Avhen he describes Julian's 
revival as 'a tragic burlesqued' And this not because oppor- 
tunity failed, still less because Julian's own powers w^ere 
slight or efforts feeble. 

1 Amm. M. xvi. xii. 43, &c. 

■^ Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 79, p. 605 b. 



VICISTI GALILAEE ! 267 

His opportunity was nothing short of magnificent. The Julian\ 
curse of the race of Pelops had seemed to dog the doomed "t^°ily^ 
house of Constantius Chlorus. The death of Gallus in 
354 A.D. left Julian, except the reigning Emperor, sole male 
survivor of that great stock. Thereupon the fortune of the 
house seemed to accumulate all her bounties for his service. 
Fortune won to his cause Eusebia's heart: she tamed the 
jealous savagery of Constantius himself: she invested her 
darling with the purple: she mated him with an imperial 
consort: she led him past perils of false friends and perils of 
indomitable foes; she stood by him at the council board and 
in the field of battle; she wafted him on wings of victory 
from Strasburg and the lower Main to the German Ocean 
and the Zuider Zee : she crowned him with honour and glory 
and the gifts of good government: she named him sovereign 
Augustus: not even then did she desert him. Seldom has 
pretender thrown a more desperate stake than when in vio- 
lence to his own judgment and against his wilP Julian was 
forced to play for Empire, and plunged through the Black 
Forest eastward. But Fortune was not wearied: for Julian 
she seemed furnished with a cornucopia of blessings. Ere 
the crisis came, the crisis whose approach was to be measured 
by weeks not months, Constantius lay dead, Julian was lord 
of the world. And his power lay not in sounding titles : he 
was dowered with a magnificent prestige: he was the leader 
of a devoted army. Six years before, almost to a day^, 
the soldiers at the coronation ceremony had rattled their 
shields^ upon their knees in enthusiasm for their new Impe- 
rator: in the interval every promise, every hope had been 
more than realised. Julian was now the emperor of their 
own choice and manufacture; Celts and Petulants were eager 
to follow the star of their Augustus even to the hot and 
hated East. Nor did the army alone exult. Hellene philo- 
sophers maybe or grateful Gaul or harried Nisibis and 

^ De Broglie errs, I think, in denying this, though his remarks and note 
(L'Eglise, A-c, iv. 82) deserve careful consideration. To his quotations add 
Eunap. Hist. xix. 70. 

2 Julian was crowned Cffisar, Nov. 6, 355 : Constantius died, Nov. 3, 361. 

3 Amm. M. xv. viii. 15. 



268 



VICISTI GALILAEE ! 



Julian's 
capacity. 



Julian 

compared 

with 

Constan- 

tine. 



Mesopotamia praised God more lond than others, but a chorus 
of universal acclamation went up throughout the empire, 
Tts echo reached further still. Southward from the unknown 
regions of the Phasis, westward from Armenia and beyond 
the Tigris, northward from the tracts of Mauretania, nay 
even from Ceylon and the Maldive Isles, hurried embassies to 
do homage to the risen Sun\ There was not one boon left 
to crave from fortune. 

So much for Julian's opportunity. What of his own 
powers, and earnestness of purpose? It would be idle repe- 
tition to dilate again upon these '\ He was a brilliant general, 
whose Gallic and German campaigns for largeness of result 
as contrasted with paucity of means might compare with 
those of the great Csesar, or of Gustavus Adolphus, He was 
a successful financier, an industrious and conscientious ruler; 
he was endowed with rare intellectual gifts, and unfailing 
fixity of moral purpose. Taken all in all he possessed a 
combination of qualities such as might have secured him a 
place more than respectable among the world's great rulers. 
He bent every faculty of body and mind, every energy of his 
richly endowed nature, towards the end in which he sincerely 
believed. He spared no pains; grudged no outlay; held 
nothing in reserve; spent and was spent for his cause. More 
than this, he worked with singular wisdom and moderation. 
It is easy to say that in particular instances a little extra 
leniency or some additional severity would have been more 
judicious: but on the whole it would be hard to point out 
any salient defects either in the plan proposed or the execu- 
tion effected. 

Whether then we look at the start accorded to Julian by 
fortune, or at his own personal powers, he must be allowed 
to have the advantage over the great Constantine. He sur- 
passed him in validity and security of title, in strategic 

1 Amm. M, xxii. vii. 7, 10. 

2 Here for once Aner waxes eloquent in the Apostate's praise, " Julian 
seemed a divinely chosen instrument to prove that not even the combination 
of the highest physical moral and intellectual powers ( ! ) could any longer dog 
the triumph of the invisible forces of Christianity." De Broglie's summary 
L'Eglise (&c., iv, 405 pp. seems admirably just. 



VICISTI GALILAEE ! 269 

ability, in financial skill, ii^ literary and intellectual power, in 
capacity for application, in moral purity. Yet in spite of all 
Julian failed egregiously where Constantine splendidly suc- 
ceeded ; failed not only eventually and in the long run, but 
visibly there and then. There was one quality in which 
Julian did not surpass Constantine, in common sense and 
the power to read the spirit of his age. Constantine was 
the first Christian, Julian the last Pagan Emperor. 

The numerical details of his success^ or failure offer Limits of 
matter for endless contention. No certain statistics are pro- *"^'^^®®' 
curable. The truth must be gathered from a p7-iori reason- 
ing, eked out by scattered hints in the pages of contemporary 
writers. There are authors^ who represent Julian's efforts as 
triumphantly successful. Such a view appears unhistorical. 
It is true that there were perverts. Hekebolius the apostate 
Sophist represents to some extent a class ^; Julian, uncle to 
the Emperor, another; he earned by his compliance the Pre- 
fecture of the East : and there was no doubt many another 
man who found it as easy to shift his religion as his dress*.' 
It appears that Julian once found even in a bishop^ a Pagan 

1 The matter has been ah'eady touched on snpr. p. 258 — 9. 

2 Cf. Lame, pp. 40, 161, with whom Miicke, pp. 78, 91, though more' 
soberly, agrees in the main. 

^ Julian's raptures over 'the conversion of one Sophist' do not tally 
with any very constant occurrence of the event, Cf. Greg. Naz. Or. iv. 5 
and 65, Sok. in. 13. 

* So Asterius of Amasea, Adv. Avar. p. 208. I owed the quotation to 
Neander, but find Johnson quoting the passage at length in his Julian's Arts 
to extirpate Christianity, p. 16. His preceding classification of renegades is 
racy enough. ' First ; The Volant Squadron, that running Camp, which 
immediately wheels about upon the least signal of a Change of Eeligion. 
Those very forward People, who as soon as they knew what Julian would be 
at, presently took the Hint, and were special good Heathens in an Instant... 
Secondly, A sort of simple, unthinking and stupid Men, who... no more 
scruple the Prince's Eeligion than they doubt whether his Com be lawful 
Money. They count it... very ill manners to think themselves wiser than 
their betters, concludiug that God and the Czar know all &c., &c.' 

5 For the story of Pegasius at Ilium see Julian's seventy-eighth letter. 
Bishop Heron of Thebes may be added if Philost. vii. 13 and Chron. Pasch. i. 
p. 548 are to be trusted, and with him a minor dignitary the Presbyter 
Theoteknus, but their apostasy appears to belong to the persecution under 
Maximinus. 



270 VlCISXr GALILAEE ! 

in disguise. But to jamp from tliese individual instances to 
the facile generalisation^ that all soldiers and civil function- 
aries who, to please the sons of Constantine went over en 
masse to Galileism, during Julian's eighteen months of 
empire returned en masse to Hellenism, is quite inadmissible. 
The facts belie it. If it comes to mere counting of pips, 
there are a Proseresius and a Victorinus to set against Heke- 
bolius, a Valentinian and a Valens against Count Julian. 
From Julian's own works quite another impression is de- 
rivable. A growing despondency pervades them. The boast 

Ep. 38. to Maximus about the public celebration of services and the 
religious disposition of the soldiers may count for nothing, 
for it was penned from Illyria when Julian was little better 
' than an adventurer, fighting for empire with a halter round 
his neck, and heading soldiers of fortune who would as lief 
serve Gods as God, or the devil as either, if he proved the 
best paymaster. There is indeed one utterance, to which 
undeserved weight has been attached. It runs: — 'the gifts 

Ep. 49. of the Gods are great and splendid, passing all prayer and all 
hope; for (be Nemesis propitious to my words ^) a short while 
back none would have dared pray for so complete a change 
in so short a time.' Taken alone the words seem strons:. 
But what is the context? The statement which these words 
are used to enforce is — 'Hellenism does not yet succeed as I 
reckoned, from the fault of those who 'profess it! The 'great 
gifts of the Gods' are put in contrast to the little use made of 
them: the 'complete change' alluded to is evidently, as else- 
where^, the liberty of worship now allowed to Pagans, of 
which unfortunately they availed themselves so meagrely. 
The letter itself is on the surface of it an address to the high 
priest of Galatia, meant to encourage him and give suggestions 
in his imeven struggle with Christianity. It is really in 
complete accord with other more despondent notices pre- 
served. Few of Julian's letters can be localised with cer- 
tainty at Constantinople: such as do demonstrably belong to 

^ For whicli see Lam§ p. 40, as supr. 

* The parenthesis itself implies a misgiving. 

3 Cf. Ep. xLii. 423 Bc. 



VICISTI GALILAEE 1 271 

that first six months of sovereign power are in great part 
invitations to Court ^ or complimentary notes ^ or oflficial 
despatches ^ containing not much of interest — unless indeed 
it be their silence — concerning the Hellenic reaction. Per- 
haps the Eastern capital* was too Christian by tradition and 
every antecedent to offer a fair field. When Julian set out 
on his progress through Asia Minor, he perhaps hoped that 
Pagan indifference had been merely local. If so he must 
have been not a little chagrined. From Cappadocia comes 
a plaintive lament that there is not one 'genuine Hellene' to Ep.i. 
be found; 'most won't sacrifice, and the few who will don't 
know how.' Julian writes expressly to his friend Aristoxenus, 
begging him to import himself and show them the way. At 
Pessinus, though Julian promoted a faithful priestess, though Ep. 21. 
he praised her zeal with his own hand royal, though he reli- 
giously kept the fast of Cybele, though he indited for the or. 5. lei c 
use of devotees a pious charge, yet faith was not to be elicited or. 5. 
from Pessinus, nay not even to be purchased by the promise 
of hard cash^. At Antioch things were worse still: to restore 
Paganism was ' to turn the world upside down : ' the Chi and -^'^- see d 
the Kappa, Christ and Constantius, were everywhere ram- ^is. ses b 
pant : the issue of Julian's endeavours was a priest and one Mis. 362. 
goose at the high festival of that wealthy city®. The post 
from Alexandria^ brought news of nothing but reverses: the 
council of Beroea openly turned the cold shoulder to their Ep. 27. 
sovereign's exhortations: not even little Batnse could quite 
conceal the hypocrisy of efforts prompted by loyalty or self- 

1 e.g. Epp. 23, 31 
^e.g.Epp. 15, 39, 69. 

2 e.g. Epp. 25 b, 58. Ep. 25 to the Jews is of great interest but belongs 
probably to the Antioch period. 

4 Himerius is witness of Julian's efforts to introduce Polytheism and 
Mithras worship there. Cf. Sok. iii. 11. 

^ Ep. 49. 431 D. The letter must certainly I think be of later date than 
Julian's own visit to Pessinus in or about June, 362. 

6 Rode, p. 96 — 97, conceives that stiff-necked Antioch quite repented her- 
self, when brought to reason by Julian's morose nominee Alexander. His 
quotations are weU marshalled, but his conclusions, if space allowed, might 
well be controverted. 

7 Supr. 190 pp. 



272 VICISTI QALILAEE ! 

interest. The records of persecution under Julian prove not 
a few ebullitions of local anti-Christian spite, but none at all 
of Pagan devotion\ When priests could not keep their own 
wives and children in the path of outward orthodoxy'^, it 
could hardly be expected of the laity to make sacrifices for 
the cause. If there was any one class with whom as a whole 
Julian was successful, it was the army". He petted it, he 
bribed if, he purged it, he made it to a man his own. That 
very army, albeit with slaughter of victims and inspection 
of entrails", elected a Christian his successor. 
Julian's It is no hard problem to diagnose his failure. Christians 

failure. -^^ instinct grasped the truth. They fabled how, when Julian 
had taken the fatal step, and declared himself apostate, 
'there appeared in the entrails that he was inspecting the 
Cross encircled in a crown: how on his march from Gaul, 
as he passed by the ripening vineyards, the dew that 
fell upon his chlamys took drop by drop the form of the 
Holy Sign: hoAV, once again, as the blood spurtled from the 
fatal javelin- wound, he took of it, and flinging it away as the • 
emblem of the wasted life, cried Vicisti, Galilaeef 'Galilean, 
thou hast conquered®;' Fantastic tales like these embody a 
pictured truth. In the fulness of the promise, as in the 
weariness of the disappointments of imperial sway, Julian 
was constantly haunted by that mysterious ever-present 
power, which though he reverenced it not, by the spell of its 
dominion frustrated all his most cherished hopes. Against it 
he fought well, but fought in vain. The legends parable 
aright. From the first day of professed apostasy, from the 

1 Chap. Tin. 2 Ep. 49, 430 A b. Cf. Soz. v. 16. 

3 In this all authorities agree. Among other passages, cf. lul. Ep. 38. 
415 c, Amm. M. xxii. xii. 6, Liban. ad lul. Hyp. p. 399, Greg. Naz. Or. 
IV. c. 64—66, 80—84, Sok. iii. 13, Leo Gram. p. 95. 

* Soz. V. 17, Greg. Naz, Or. it. 82, Liban. Epit. p. 578. 

5 Amm. M. xxt. tI. 1. S. Johnson, Answer to Jovian 105 pp. Tigorously 
contends that all the army— except JoTian and Valens and Libanius' hypo- 
thetical murderer of Julian— were professed heathens, and quotes Theod. 
IT. 1. The facts are against the theory. 

6 This famous story first giTen by Theod. iii. 25, and diTersified into 
a Tariety of shapes, is no doubt unhistorical. 'NeviKTjKas TaXlXaie are the 
■words, of which the Latin has become the traditional form of quotation. 



viciSTi galilaee! 273 

hour when he instituted aggressive tactics against Christianity, 
at his departure from Vienne no less truly than at that later 
departure from Antioch, already 'the carpenter's son' was at 
work 'making a coffin\' Fortune might still lavish gifts, but 
all were useless, so long as the fundamental weakness was 
un eradicated. The Apostate's powers remained all they had 
been; his energy grew with the increased demands upon it. 
Yet a vital paralysis laid hold of all his schemes and efforts. 
He threatened and he thrust at an enemy or rather enemies 
that seemed slow and yielding and not always brave; yet the 
despised antagonists needed hardly so much as to parry the 
thrusts ; they fell innocuous, exhausting chiefly the strength 
of the assailant. Weight of numbers and some secret im- 
petus kept pressing them forward. It was hard work for the 
attack to gain a single inch, while confidence, harbinger of 
victory, waned visibly. Sooner or later too the solitary 
fighter must retire, and leave the arena to his adversaries. 
Failure was indeed a foregone conclusion. The cause was 
already lost when Julian took up cudgels for it. He might 
make proselytes, even in some numbers, of a more or less 
worthless kind: ambition, self-interest, superstition, hatred of 
Christianity, and a hundred other motives were busy tempt- 
ing men to avow the Imperial creed. But into not one of 
his proselytes could he infuse the genuine sincerity and 
enthusiasm which animated himself. A pedant dreamer still, 
even in the stir and push of busy action, he lived in a past 
world. His thoughts, beliefs, aspirations, all belonged to 
another date, and centered in a bygone age. He cast in liis 
lot with all that was in the truest sense stale and unprogres- 
sive^ Less practical and clear-sighted than his great exem- 
plar, Marcus Aurelius, he made a gross miscalculation of the 
forces round about him: he transposed and inverted them 
every one. ' He turned his face to the past, and his back upon 
the future ^' No wonder that he failed so unequivocally and 
irremediably. He supposed that Hellenism' was a principle 
of recreative life, whereas in reality its roots were all decayed, 

1 For the well-known story cf. Soz. vi. 2, Theod. iii. 23, Nikeph. x. 35. 

2 Cf. Naville, Jul. I'Apost. pp. 83, 84, Mangold, p. 27, Lasaulx, p. 59. 
'* Chateaubr. Etud. Hist. n. p. 57. 

R. E. 18 



274 vicisTi galilaee! 

and its last flowers already beginning to droop. 'Christianity 
was a living plant, which imparted its vitality to the foreign 
suckers grafted upon it; the dead and sapless trunk of Paga- 
nism withered even the living boughs which were blended 
with it, by its own inevitable decay \ Julian essayed to head 
a reaction which if successful would have revolutionised the 
world's history. So disastrous would it have been that it 
becomes difficult even to figure the result to the imagination. 
Had Julian's cultured Hellenism triumphed over despised 
and rejected Galileism, the sole power would have been anni- 
hilated, which was destined to tame the barbarian, establish 
law, save learning, elevate humanity, and construct from the 
debris of the empire European civilisation. No greatness, 
no self-sacrifice, no singleness of aim, no accumulation of 
merit in the leader can atone for the demerits of his cause. 
Newman's eulogium and Comte's imprecation are alike justi- 
fied. Julian was as near as might be the vir sapiens; 
Julian's cause was Antichrist. Herein lies the infinite pathos 
of his career^ Viewed on the religious side it must remain 
always manqu^, abortive, disappointing whether to pourtray or 
to ponder. History shows few sadder samples of noble views 
distorted, great powers misapplied, and high aims worse than 
wasted. There is a twice-told tale^ how in youth Julian 
essayed to raise a memorial shrine to the holy Mamas; but as 
he built, the earth at the foundations crumbled, for God and 
his holy martyr deigned not to accept the labour and offering 
of his hands. It is an allegory of his life. He toiled on 
rotten foundations. The edifice tumbled before it could be 
reared; nay its weight sapped the substructure. 

'Julian's life was an accident, and at his death events 
reverted to their natural channel.' Such is the brief sum- 
mary of Julian's reign which a calm and generous writer* 
has set down. Of the main issue involved the words are 

1 Milman, Hist. Christ, ii. 453. 

2 Mangold, p. 27. 

» Cf. Greg. Naz. Or. v. 24—29, p. 88—90, rehearsed in Theod. in. 2, Soz., 
Sok., &c. How the anecdote laid hold of Christian imagination is seen by 
its repetition in Leo Gram., Glykas, &c. 

* Beugnot, p. 221. 



VICISTI GALILAEE ! 275 

literally true. But it is impossible that no side-issues should 
have been determined by so pretentious and so decisive a 
conflict. The more important of these may be briefly indi- 
cated. 

First then, on the negative side, Hellenism as a religious Hellenism 
creed was finally discredited. It was tried and found want- J^^^^ ^*^ 
ing. It was well — perhaps necessary — that this should be religion; 
so. Above all it was well that it should receive a fair trial : 
that Neo-Platonism should rally all the available forces of 
intellect and religion for a life and death struggle, fought 
under a captain of such consummate power and discretion as 
Julian. In that way Pagans learnt quicker and more con- 
clusively that it was irretrievably doomed, that all hope of 
restoration was chimerical: in that way Christians attained to 
more solid assurance that God's cause was their own. Short 
as was Julian's reign it was long enough to make its verdict 
most explicit. Dreamers to be sure there were, fatuous 
pedants self-blinded by their own conceits, who against hope, 
almost against light and knowledge, hoped still that Hellen- 
ism had a future in store; who persisted that nothing but 
Julian's death had postponed the eventual triumph; who 
hugged the baseless fancy that the accident of some new 
Emperor's creed could change the current of history \ and 
traced in Julian the antitype of the coming Messiah of Neo- 
Platonism. But such fools or fanatics dwindled fast. It 
would have been too much to hope that one individual could 
at a stroke disenchant a whole world of its folly. As it was 
Julian's career taught all sober Hellenes from Libanius 
downwards the needed truth that their creed was doomed. 
It soon slunk away from the towns, and as the reader of 
Libanius' Oration for the Temples may see, lingered on in 
harvest-homes and vintage-feasts, and immemorial festivals 
of peasant folk, till it could incorporate itself unsuspected 
with Christian observances. Within ten years of Julian's 
death Hellenism is first officially called 'Paganism.' A 
longer reign could have scarcely served the purpose better. 
Increased pressure, or active persecution (had Julian been 

^ Kingsley in his Hypatia harps often on this string. 

• 18—2 



276 



VICISTI GALILAEE 



and intel- 
lectually. 



Effects of 
reaction 
on the 
Christian 
Church. 



driven into such a course) might have multiplied proselytes 
and perverts; but assuredly faithful martyrs would have 
matched their witness against false apostates. Julian did 
not err in thinking that his death came at a happy hour. 
Fortune continued kind to the last. The Gods loved him 
when they suffered him to die young. He had lived years 
enough to show how futile an attempt, nay rather how irre- 
trievable a failure, was the consummation of his schemes. 
Life prolonged could have proved but prolonged disappoint- 
ment, and perhaps too sullied fame. 

Julian's failure did not merely discredit Hellenism as a 
creed. It also precipitated its fall as an intellectual system. 
It is instructive to note how Julian's one salient act of dis- 
tinct persecution recoiled upon itself, not without reflex 
mischief to the world at large. Before his time the breach 
between Christianity and the schools had not become im- 
passable. More than once Christian hands had reached 
across and taken of their hid treasures, and displayed and 
praised aloud their beauty and cunning. Julian in short- 
sighted jealousy repelled and prohibited all such advances. 
To do so was to sign the death-warrant of Hellenism. He 
exposed his unshattered aspirations, and opened Christian 
eyes to their real strength. He 'made men feel how intensely 
anti-christian was the spirit of the schools, and how great was 
the possible danger of a like revivaP.' As Hellenic faith 
died, the sole hope for Hellenic culture was that as the 
adopted child of Christianity it might find a safe and honour- 
ed home. It may have been that the times were not yet 
ripe for such a connexion, and that under no circumstances it 
could have been realised, but at least Julian did his worst to 
render it for ever impossible, when he imposed premature 
disabilities, and barred every advance under ban of excom- 
munication. 

Incidentally however Julian's endeavours were fraught 
with certain good results. Morall}^, except by making the 
un worthiness of Paganism more palpable, they left it little 



^ Capes, Univ. Life dx., p. 126. 
Buperficially) takes the opposite view. 



Herwerden, pp. 93, 94 (I think more 



viciSTi galilaee! 277 

better and little worse than before. Not so with Christianity. 
For the Church Julian's reign was an unmixed benefit. At 
his accession it was in terrible distress. The bi-partite Aca- 
cian Councils of Seleucia and Ariminum had already (859 A.D.) 
surrendered the Homoilsion of Nicaea. Had Constantius 
gone on to reign much longer, orthodoxy, humanly speaking, 
would have been extinct. Rapid and unlooked-for success 
had soiled the Church's purity. The chiefest Christian 
virtues had fallen into obscurity, or transformed themselves 
to vices. Humility, charity, forbearance, simplicity and un- 
assuming piety retired from the world's gaze; in times of 
religious even more than of political embroilment simplicity, 
however noble, is laughed out and hides its head*; too often 
zeal turned to bigotry, firmness to intolerance, fearless 
patience to domineering arrogance. In the plenitude of 
new-won power, the Church was rioting in all the inebriation 
of success. Julian broke in upon the revels, a monitor no 
less salutary than unwelcome. His reign acted upon Christi- 
anity as an invaluable purge or disinfectant. Directly and 
indirectly, in morals and in dogma, it purified the Church, 
both laity and clerics; it shamed or frightened not a few 
from their absorption in cavilling disputations^; it brought 
back the orthodox from their banishment to guide once more 
the helm of council. Even in the short space allowed him 
by Julian's irritation, Athanasius was able to preside at the 
Council of Alexandria. If the Emperor had harboured a 
shrewd hope that the return of the exiles would be the 
renewal of squabbles, the verdict of that Council must have 
been a mortification. All Bishops who had been cowed or 
surprised into Arianism were suffered to rehabilitate them- 
selves by virtue of simple signature of the Nicene formulary. 
The Councils that preceded Julian's accession mark the high 

^ Sia Tds (TTaffeii to eSrjOes ov rb yivvMov irKeiaTOv fierix^i't KaTayeKacrBkv 
ri(f>avl(je-n. Thuk. in. 83. 

2 Miicke, ii. pp. 74, 79, 80, quite neglects Ohiirch history when he repre- 
sents Christian rancour as undiminished. Lasaulx, p. 89, argues that 
increased mutual forbearance between Christians and Pagans was also one 
result of Juhan's reaction, but this I doubt. 



278 VICISTI OALILAEE ! 

tide of encroaching Arianism: his reign* sees it waver; the 
first council that followed his death, when at Lampsacus the 
Homoean symbol of Ariminum was condemned and fifty- 
nine semi-Arian Bishops openly subscribed the Homousion, 
marks its decided refluence. Julian's reign not only sobered 
factions, and developed reconciliation: it also separated the 
worldly and the hjrpocrite from the true man and the believer, 
sorting and sifting out a purified residue. It proved that 
though overlaid with error, and stifled by foul excrescences, 
and charged with heavy vapours, the vital forces of Christi- 
anity were potent still. And one other service it partly did. 
Premature recognition by the State had damagingly paga- 
nised Christianity. In art, in ritual and in politics the 
Church showed traces of too facile accommodation to heathen 
modes of thought. Men were abruptly reminded that the 
distinctions between heathenism or Hellenism and Christi- 
anity were something more than verbal differences. Even 
at the cost of some irritation of susceptibilities, and some 
narrowing of sympathies, it was a lesson most needful to 
learn. Julian had not lived in vain. 

1 The provincial synod of Gallic prelates, who excommTinicated Satur- 
ninus and rejected the formula of Ariminum, took place after Julian was 
proclaimed Augustus, though before his accession to sole power. (De Broglie 
IV. 93.) 



APPENDICES. 



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APPENDIX B. 



CHEONOLOGICAL TABLES OF JULIAN'S LIFE. 



A.D. 

331 Nov. 6. Birth of Julian, son of 
luL Constantius and Basilina, at 
Constantinople. {Note 1.) 

332 Death of Jiilian's mother Ba- 
silina. 

332—336 According to Teuffel's pro- 
bable conjecture, suggested by Ep. 
46, Julian spent these years on his 
mother's estate at Bithynia. 



337 Julian, concealed by Mark, Bp. of 
Arethusa, escapes the massacre of 
his relatives, which followed the 
death of the great Constantine. 

JuUan is entrusted to the care of 
the family eunuch Mardonius. 

337 — 344 Eesidence atConstantinople. 
(In the earlier part of this period 
must be placed a hypothetical stay 
at Nikomedia. Note 2.) 

J. attends school under charge of 
Mardonius ; is instructed in reh- 
gion by Eusebius, Bp. first of Niko- 
media, subsequently of Constanti- 
nople. 



344 to commencement of 350. {Note 3.) 
Eesidence at MaceUum in Cap- 
padocia, with his brother Gallus. 



A.D. 

331 



332 Constantius conducts war with 
Sarmatians. 

333 Dec. 25. Constans made Caesar, 

335 Constantine celebrates his tri- 
cennalia. 

Sept. Dahnatius made Caesar. 
Hannibalianus set over Pontic dis- 
trict, and married to Constantia. 

336 Constantius marries (Galla) 
Fausta. {App. A, n. 3.) 

337 May 22. Death of the great Con- 
stantine. Joint rule of Constantine 
n., Constans and Constantius com- 
mences. 

Murder of lul. Constantius, 
Dalmatius^, Hannibalianus, &c. 
Sapor ravages Mesopotamia. 
338—339 First siege of Nisibis by 
Sapor. Constantius at head of army 
in East. 

340 Constantine II. defeated and killed 
by Constans near AquUeia. 

(? perhaps in 339) Eusebius 
transferred from the see of Niko- 
raedia to Constantinople. 

341 Constans at war in Gaul, con- 
tinued into next year. Athanasius 
deposed by Arian synod at Antioch. 

342 Constans victorious in Gaul. 
Death of Eusebius of Nikomedia. 

343 Constans in Britain. 

345 Libanius commences work at 
Nikomedia. 

346 Second (three months) siege of 
Nisibis by Sapor. 

347 Council of Sardica and Phihppo- 
polis. 

348 Indecisive engagement of Con- 
stantius with Persians at Singara. 

349 Athanasius returns to Alexan- 
dria. 



1 Perhaps early n 338. 



282 



APPENDIX B. 



A.D. 

350 Julian ia recalled to Constanti- 
nople, where he attends lectures. 



351 Julian removes to Nikomedia, 
where Libanius was lecturing : Du- 
ring his stay here has an interview 
with Gallus, now Cassar, en route 
for the East. 

851 — 354 At Nikomedia Julian be- 
comes acquainted with many leading 
Neo-platonists of the day, e. g. Li- 
banius, Aedesius, Chrysanthius, 
Prisons, Eusebius, &c. To prose- 
cute his studies travels through 
Asia Minor, visiting Pergamus, E- 
phesus, &c., where prob. he first 
met the philosopher Maximus. 
Some (but see Note 4) assume here 
a residence at the University of 
Athens. 

354 Julian is summoned from Ionia 
to Milan after the execution of 
Gallus. Seven months of semi- 
imprisonment, divided between Mi- 
lan and Comum. 

355 Through Eusebia's good ofl&cea 
Julian is permitted about the be- 
ginning of July to leave Milan for 
Greece, to resume his studies there. 
Julian goes to Athens. 

Oct. Julian is recalled suddenly 
from Athens, and reaches Milan. 

Nov. 6. Julian publicly made 
Caesar. 

Julian's marriage with Helena. 

Orat. I. Panegyric on Constan- 
tius. 

Dec. 1. Juhan, with small es- 
cort, leaves Milan for Gaul. 

356 Juhan's first Consulship as col- 
. league to Constantius. J. winters 

at Vienne. 

First campaign in Gaul. Julian, 
having, June 24, relieved Augustu- 
dunum (Autun), fights his way by 
Autosiodorum (Auxerre), and Tri- 
cas8B (Trbyes), and occupies Broto- 
magus (Briimath), Eigomagum (Ee- 



A.D. 

360 Jan. Magnentius assumes Em- 
pire in the West, and kills Con- 
stans. March. Vetranio proclaimed 
at Mursia, and {June) Nepotianus 
at Eome. Nepotianus is killed : 
Vetranio deposed by Constantius. 

Gallus recalled from Macellum 
owing to Persian difficulties. Sapor's 
third (four months) siege of Nisibis. 

Dviring the spring of this year 
Libanius lectured at Constantinople, 
returning in summer to Nikome- 
dia. 
351 March. Gallus becomes Casar. 

Sept. Defeat of Magnentius at 
Mursa by Constantius. 



352 Constantius gets the mastery of 
Magnentius, who retires into Gaul. 

Gallus suppresses Jewish insur- 
rection: plays the tyrant at An- 
tioch. 

353 Aug. Magnentius, defeated in 
Gaul, commits suicide at Lugdu- 
num. 

Constantius marries Eusebia ; 
repairs to Gaul in the autumn. 

Gallus continues his misgovem- 
ment at Antioch. 

354 Gallus in obedience to Constan- 
tius' desire repairs to Europe: ia 
put to death at Flanona near Pola. 



355 Constantius at war with the 
Alamanni. 

Sylvanus' • abortive insurrection 
and fall. 

Synod of Milan condemns Atha- 
nasius. 

Liberius banished. 



356 George of Cappadoeia, with help 
of Syrianus, takes possession of the 
see of Alexandria. Athanasius con- 
ceals himself in the Thebais. 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES OF JULIANS LIFE. 



283 



magen), Confluentes (Coblenz), and 
Colonia Agrippina (Koln). He 
marches by way of the Treveri 
(Treves) to the territory of the 
Senones (Sens), where he is be- 
sieged in winter quarters. 

In this year his first-horn son 
died at time of birth. Helena, J.'s 
wife, repairs to Eome. 

357 Julian's second Consulship with 
Constantius. 

Orat. II. III. Panegyrics to Con- 
stantius 1 and Eusebia. 

Helena goes to Eome— becomes 
mother of a son stUl-born. 

Orat. VIII. On the departure of 
Salustiiis. 

Second campaign in Gaul. Marred 
at the outset by Barbatio's treachery. 
Defeat of Barbatio on right bank of 
Ehine, and his departure for Court. 
Julian's great victory over King 
Chnodomar at Argentoratum (Stras- 
burg). J. crossing the Ehine ravages 
the territory of the Alamanni to the 
lower Main. 

358 Jan. Goes into winter quarters 
at Paris. 

Third campaign in Gaul. J. re- 
duces the Salian and Chamavian 
Franks. Crosses the Ehine, and 
humbles Suomar and Hortar kings 
of the Alamanni. 



357 May. Constantius' triumphal 

entry into Eome. 

At the end of May Constantius 

marches against Suevi and Quadi in 
■ Ehcetia, 



358 Negotiations with Persia. Sapor 
advances haughty pretensions. 

Constantius' successful Quadian 
and Sarmatian war. 

Aug. Liberius returns to Eome. 

Aug. Earthquake at Nikomedia. 



359 J. strengthens the Ehine fortifi- 
cations, &c., and finally humbles 
the restless Alamanni cMefs. 



360 Julian's third Consulship with 
Constantius. 

Administrative and financial re- 
forms ia Gaul. 

Julian is proclaimed Augustus 
by his troops at Paris. Crosses the 
Ehine, and chastises the Attuarii. 

Julian winters at Vieime and 
there celebrates his quinquennalia. 

Death of Helena, and conveyance 
of her remains to Eome. 

361 Jan. Julian at Vienne. 
Julian having provided for order 

in Gaul, at the opening of summer 



359 Sapor invades the Empire. Pro- 
longed siege and capture of Amida. 
July 21— Oct. 7. 

Synods of Ariminum and Se- 
leucia. 

360 Synod of Constantinople, and 
deposition of Bp. Macedonius. 

Sapor re-invades Mesopotanaia. 
Capture of Singara and Bezabde 
(Phoenice). 

Constantius marches eastwards, 
and tries in vain to retake Be- 
zabde. 

Death of Eusebia^. 

Constantius winters at Antioch. 

Constantius' marriage with Faus- 
tina. 

361 Synod at Antioch. 
Constantius from Edessa watches 

Sapor's movements. Eventually 



1 So Desjardins, p. 202, n. xxiv. : MUcke, p. 161, supposes it put forth at Constantinople in S61 
A.D. as a kind of olive-branch to the adherents of Constantius. 

* I do not remember any precise chronological notice of Eusebia's death. In the middle of S5T 
she was alive and well. In recording Constantius' marriage with Faustina at the end of 360, Amm. 
M. 21. 6. 4 speaks of Eusebia as iam pridem amisscmi. The date 360 is only fairly probable ; De Brog. 
IV. p. 91. 



284 



APPENDIX B. 



crossed the Ehine, and followed the 
Inter down to Sirmium, where he 
took up his abode, and reorganised 
Illyria, Dalmatia, &c. 

Letter to the Senate and People of 
Athens. 

Two legions, faithful to Con- 
stantius, hold Aquileia. 

On the borders of Thrace Julian 
receives news of Constantius' death ; 
enters Constantinople as sole Em- 
peror (Dec), and takes up his resi- 
dence there, Aquileia surrenders. 

Letter to Themistius the PhilosO' 
pher. 

362 Julian at Constantinople. 
Orat. Yii. Against Heraklius the 

Cynic. 

May. Julian leaves Constanti- 
nople — journeys eastward by Li- 
byssa, Nikomedia, Niksea, Pessinus, 
and Ankyra — passes Taurus by 
Pylae and so by Tarsus to Antioch. 

Orat. V. In honour of the 
Mother of the Gods ^. 

{June or) July. Julian reaches 
Antioch {Note 7). 

Orat. VI. Against ill-taught Cy- 
nics. 

Dec. Orat. iv. To King Sun. 

363 Fragment of a Letter. 
Misopogon. 

Boohs against the Christians. 

Mar. 5. Juhan sets out from 
Antioch. 

April. Julian invades Persian 
territory. 



relieved from fear of invasion, he 
Bets out in full force against Julian. 



Nov. 3 (See Note 5). Death of 
Constantius at Mopsukrense : fol- 
lowed by state funeral at Constanti- 
nople. 

Chalcedon Commission com- 
mences sittings. 

362 Artemius executed; Bp. George 
murdered at Alexandria. (See Note 
6.) Athanasius at once reappears 
in Alexandria. 

Sept. Council of Alexandria. 

Oct. 22. Temple of Daphne 
burnt. 

Nov. J. banishes Athanasius 
from Egypt. Subsequently, in reply 
to an embassy from Alexandria 
pleading the cause of their Bp, 
declines to reconsider his decision. 



363 Athanasius leaves Alexandria. 



1 Desjardins, p. 62, supposes it composed at Pessinus; Mucke, p. 171, would transfer it to 
Kallinikon on Euphrates, March 363 a.d. Clinton oddly localises it at Constantinople. 



NOTES. 285 



NOTES. 

[The fullest discussion of the Chronology of Julian's youth is to be found in an 
article by Teuffel in Schmidt's Zeitsch. fiir Geschichtswissensehaft. 1845. 
Vol. IV. pp. 143—156.] 

JVote 1. Date of Julian's Birth. 

Though, the authorities are by no means in exact agreement, the year 
331 A. D. seems tolerably certain as the date of Julian's birth, though some 
historians prefer to place it in 332 a.d., agreeing with Victor's {Epit. 42) 
saying that he was nearly ^ 23 when made Csesar, sc. 355 a.d. 

The day of his birth was JVov. 6. 

At Constantius' accession, sc. i/ay 337, he was ' not yet eight,' Sok. iii. 
1 ; 'still in his 8th year,' Soz. v. 2; both which are in favour of 331 as 
against 332, though Nikeph. x. 1. 6 is more correct still in saying that he 
had not yet reached his 8th year. 

Writing to the Alexandrians {Ep. 51) at the close of 362 Julian speaks 
of himself as 20 years a Christian, and now in his 12th year of Paganism ; 
this accords with his being born in 331. 

In Feb. 363 {Misop. 353 a) ' more than thirty ' is Julian's own inde- 
cisive expression. 

Julian's death took place June 363. Eutr. x. 16 says correctly that 
he was 31, Jer. Euseh. Chron. ' in his 32nd year,' and so Amm. M. xxv. iii. 
23, if indeed that be the correct rendering of anno aetatis altera et 
tricensimo. Sok. iii. 21 and Chron. Edess. make the slip of saying ' in the 
31st year of his life,' by which they probably mean ' not yet 32,' as Sok. 
has already himself supplied us with an earlier date. 

Note 2. Eesidence at Nikomedia. 

From Amm. M. xxii. 9. 4 it appears proper to assume here a residence of 
Julian at Nikomedia. Miicke, p. 24, wishes to set aside the statement of 
Ammian, and to suppose that Eusebius superintended Julian's education 
only during a visit to Constantinople. But the context in Ammian re- 
moves all possibility of an accidental misstatement of place, as it turns 
upon Julian's recognition of friends and scenes in Nikomedia familiar to 
him in boyhood. [On the other hand we may remember that Julian 
certainly knew Nikomedia from a subsequent residence there, about which 
Amm. is silent, and therefore, so Rode (p. 22) rather harshly argues, unin- 

1 The fere is absurd, seeing that Julian assumed the Cffisarship actually on 
his birthday. 



28G APPENDIX B. 

formed.] Neander {The Emperor Julian, &c.) finds chronological diffi- 
culties in the statement that Eusebius instructed him at Nikomedia. But 
Eusebius' translation to the see of Constantinople did not take place till 
339 A.D. No positive evidence forbids our supposing that Julian migrated 
to Nikomedia at the end of 337, or in 338 a.d. Indeed he may have been 
there at the time of Constantine's death. The historians pass but lightly 
over Julian's early years. Part of this period preceding the residence at 
Macellum he no doubt spent at Constantinople. May he not have fol- 
lowed Eusebius there, if that Bishop was indeed entrusted with the lad's 
education ? 

Desjardins, p. 8, vmtenably makes Julian reside throughout with Mar- 
donius at Nikomedia. 



Note 3. Residence at Macellum. 

That this residence extended over six consecutive years (cf. ad Ath. 
271 c) is consentiently affirmed by our authorities, and unquestioned by 
modern writers. But as to the exact date of these six years (which Liban. 
and Sok. curiously ignore) there is great variety of opinion. Miicke, p. 11, 
endorses the blunder of Theod. iv. 2, and makes the Macellum exile ensue 
directly upon the murder of J.'s relatives, so as to occupy 339 — 345. 
Against this there are decisive arguments. 1. There is nothing in the 
history of Julian or Gallus satisfactorily to fill the years 345 — 351. 2. This 
early date, covering Julian's boyhood from eight to fourteen, does not tally 
with expressions used concerning Julian, nor with accounts of his doings at 
Macellum. In Ad Ath. 271 B Julian speaks of himself as Ko[jLi8fj fieipaKLnv 
at the time of his transference : the expression accords quite as well with 
eleven or twelve as with eight. But Theod. iii. 2 is more precise ; Julian 
is avrj^os at the commencement, rising to Trpoa-rj^os and e(f>r]^os diu-ing the 
term of the residence ; the earliest age allowed by these expressions is 
eleven to seventeen. Greg. Naz.'s language els avbpas -n-poiovres {Or. iv. 
556 c) is inapplicable to a boy of fourteen. Further, the account of 
rhetorical themes written for or against Christianity, and still more the 
reading in Church, favour strongly the later date. Would a boy of 13 or 
14 have already fulfilled the functions of lector ? 3. From Ad Ath. 274 a 
it appears that Constantius saw Julian in Cappadocia. This must in all 
probability have been in March 347, when alone Constantius was in 
Caesarea : but the year 347 falls outside Miicke's limits. (Cf Sievers, 
Studien, &c., p. 228.) 4. It may be added that the going to school, the 
attendance at theatres &c., under the regime of Mardonius imply a more 
continuous residence in Constantinople than Miicke allows for. 

The correct date for the Macellum residence must be 344 — 350. For 
Julian it probably came to an end about the middle of 350 ; GoWms, perhaps 
left earlier in the year. Any later date, e.g. Teuflfel, who adopts 345 — 351, 



NOTES. 287 

Lamd, who (p. 28) speaks of Julian as 'going on for fifteen' when he 
reached Macellum, and Chastel, who (p. 126) says 'already fifteen,' seems 
incorrect. The residence certainly terminated before Gallus' elevation to 
the Csesarship, which took place early in 351, not 350 as Auer p. 2, 
Miicke p. 15, &c., wrongly put it. Further, though Julian, Ad Ath. 272 A, 
speaks rhetorically of Gallus as going ' straight from the wilds to the 
palace,' a not inconsiderable interval must be allowed between the de- 
parture from Macellum and the exaltation to the Csesarship. Gallus, 
according to Soz. v. 2, on his departure from Macellum went to Ephesus 
for a while : in this statement (see Eode's criticisms (p. 27 n.) on Miicke's 
chronology) Soz. is probably only redishing Sok.'s correct account of Gallus' 
stay in Ionia after the 337 a. d. assassinations ; but in any case time must 
be allowed for Gallus to go to Court (Constantius was at the time involved 
in his troubles with Magnentius), there marry Constantina, and come back 
as Caesar to the East. Julian's proceedings — (for it seems on the whole, 
notwithstanding TeufFel's arguments, most natural to refer the confused 
accounts of Constantius' jealousy in Lib. Epitaph. 525 and Sok. iii. 1 to 
this and not the earlier stay in Constantinople, to Julian the young man of 
18, not Julian the boy of 12) — require an equally long period. He came 
from Macellum to Constantinople, attended lectures there evidently for 
some little time, became the mark for gossip, roused the Emperor's jea- 
lousies, received orders to betake himself to Nikomedia, and was already 
established there (Liban. Epit. p. 527) when Gallus passed eastward as 
Csesar in the spring of 351. [This argument falls to the ground if 
Ammian's statement (see note 2 on p. 54 ; TeufFel trips strangely in saying 
the question is chronologically indifferent) that J.'s interview with Gallus 
took place at Constantinople be preferred to Libanius'. It may be added 
however that Sievers, Studien, &c. p. 229, supposes the interview recorded 
by Ammian to be a different interview occurring on Gallus' return from the 
East, and supports this theory by rather elaborate conjectures.] 

Rode, p. 25, suggests 349 as quite as probable a" date for the departure 
from Macellum as 350, but wrongly. It is fairly clear that Nikomedia, 
not Constantinople, is where Julian first came in contact with Libanius' 
lectures. Now Libanius (cf. Clinton, Fasti Romani) removed from 
Nikomedia to Constantinople early in 350, and returned to Nikomedia in 
the summer. Julian arrived at Constantinople after his departure (sc. 
summer, 350), when his praises were still in every one's mouth. 



Note 4. Visits to Athens. 

The number of Julian's visits to Athens is a very moot point. Neander 
in his monograph on Julian postulates three separate visits, but as no 
successor has defended his error, does not require particular refutation. 



288 APPENDIX B. 

The real controversy lies between two ^^sit^ and one visit. On the 
historicity of the visit to Athens after the release from Comum in 355 all 
are agreed (cf. Ad Ath. 273 b, Amm. M. xv. ii. 8, Liban. Epit. p. 531, &c.); 
the question is, Did Julian resort to Athens in the interval between his 
arrival at Nikomedia in 351, and his sudden summons from Ionia to 
Milan in 354'^ Wiggers, in Zeitschr. fur die hist. Theol.^ 1837, p. 131, 
ignores any such visit ; so too does Lame, who is however no guide to 
accurate chronology. Teuffel, Desjardins, Richter and Rode all reject the 
first visit, which other writers, except Sievers, who gives arguments but 
suspends judgment, assume, and which MUcke, p. 28, vmtenably extends over 
three years, 358 — 354. The objections alleged are (1) That Julian wovdd 
not have spoken {Or. ill. p. 118 d) of 'a long-cherished desirei to see Greece, 
had he resided there previously. (2) That Julian does not discriminate 
two visits in his manifesto addressed to the Athenians. (3) That the 
theory of two visits cannot be extracted from Libanius or Greg. Naz., 
while any visit defined by them is that which took place after the death of 
Gallus. To (1) it may be replied that the TrdXai can be referred without vio- 
lence to the seven months of semi-captivity : to (2) that between the recall 
of Gallus from Macellum and his execution no note of time or circumstance 
is given : to (3) that the evidence though weighty is negative in character. 
Negative it must of necessity be, if in truth there were but one visit. 
That neither Julian, nor any of the best-informed writers, should have 
explicitly alluded to the . double residence, if historical, appears to me 
incredible. But I subjoin the strongest case that can be made out on 
the other side. 

1. Eunap. Vit. Max. connects Julian's visit to Athens (he speaks of 
only one) immediately with his intercourse with Maximus. 2. The traKtv 
in Ad Them. 260 a, where Julian speaks of taking his departure again 
(TraXti/), sc. a second time, for Greece, receives a scarcely natural explanation 
from the upholders of a single residence only. 3. The term ' his mother's 
hearth ' in Ad Ath. 273 B, still more the o'Uabe (if rightly referable to 
Athens) of Or. in. 118 b, imply a previous acquaintance with Athens (for 
the passages c£ note 4 on p. 56), but TeufFel interprets them naturally of 
Julian's intention to repair to Bithynia or Ionia. 4. The residence at 
Athens in 355 seems singularly brief, if it be the only one, for the import- 
ance constantly attached to it. Gallus' execution took place in Dec. 354. 
Juhan was then sent for, and could not have arrived at Milan before the 
end of 354 at earliest. There he was kept in durance seven months, 
which bring us to at least the beginning of July 355. He became Caesar 
Nov. 6, having already been some weeks at Milan. Thus into July, August 
and Sept. (MUcke's idea that he returned to Milan by June 1 is based on a 
misunderstanding) must be crowded the roundabout journey from Milan 
into Greece (J. went by Sirmium, as we learn from Ad Ath. 273 c, and then 
probably indirect), the residence at Athens, and the journey to Italy. 



NOTES. 289 



Note 5. Death of Constantius. 

Constantius died on Nov. 3 according to Sok. ii. xlvii. 4, in. i. 1, and 
Idatius Fasti. Ammian's abiit e vita tertium nonarum- Octohrium is a slip, 
to be corrected into Novembrium (see Clinton, Fasti Bom.), 



Note 6. Death of Bp. George. 

About George's death Gibbon, chap. 23, is exceedingly precise with 
what appears to me hopelessly wrong chronology. According to him 
Julian's accession is proclaimed at Alexandria, Nov. 30, 361. The arch- 
bishop George is at once dragged to prison, and after 24 days, viz. on Dec. 
24 the prison is broken open and the prisoner lynched. Athanasius returns 
in triumph Feb. 21, 362. Having by no means mastered the requisite 
authorities I criticise with the greatest deference chronology so precise, the 
evidence for which I have not unravelled \ I can only say that Amm. M. 
XXII, xi. 3 distinctly attributes the fall of George to the sentence and execu- 
tion of Artemius, which took place about the time (Amm. M. xxii. xi. 2) 
of Julian's arrival at Antioch, sc. the end of Jime 362. Julian's Epp. 26, 
6, 51 will then belong naturally enough to the later months of 362. 
Gibbon objects that the events thus become crowded, but July, August and 
September allow abundant time for Athanasius to re-establish himself, and 
call out Ep. 26 and 6 in October : indeed to postpone these to a period eight 
or nine months after Athanasius' return seems w/inatural. Tillemont 
adopts a like arrangement. 



Note 7. Julian's Visit to Antioch, 

Julian certainly reached Antioch in July, and probably early in that 
month. 

Until the beginning of May he was legislating (of. Theod. Cod. xi. 
xii. 2) at Constantinople. The date of his edict from Nikomedia {Theod. 
Cod. VII. iv. 8) is unfortunately not preserved. Now on July 28 we find him 
issuing laws {Theod. Cod. i. xvi. 8) from Antioch, and his letter to the 
Bostrenians, written from Antioch, is expressly dated August 1. That he 
was at Constantinople in May and at Antioch in July is thus clear. Two 
other notes of time occur, Julian appears to have been at Pessinus during 
the festival of Cybele : he certainly reached Antioch (Amm. M. xxii. ix. 
15) during the Adonis feast, which throughout the East had been fused 

1 I imagine they are from the Veronese fragment published by the Marquis 
Maffei, to which Gibbon refers in a note. 

R. E. 19 



290 APPENDIX B. 

with the wailing for Tammuz. Some (cf. Macrob. Sat. i, 21) place these 
celebrations after the autumnal equinox ; in reality they took place at or 
immediately after the summer solstice (cf. Amm. M. xxii, 9, Jul, Or. iv. 
155 c, and see Clinton's Fast. Rom., Jondot's Hist, de VEmp. Jul. ii. p. 130, 
Desjard. p. 48, De Brog. iv. 226 n., Rode p. 68, 72, Baring Gould's Curious 
Myths &c., p. 286), and fix Julian's arrival to the end of June, or very 
beginning of July. Libanius not only says that Julian stayed at Antioch 
* the whole summer and winter,' but attests still more precisely {Epitaph. 
p, 578) that he resided there ' nine months,' To satisfy this even roughly, 
seeing that he left Antioch on March 5, he must have arrived earlier than 
July 5, 

Miicke p, 105 — 6 and Auer p, 262 follow the incorrect assertion of Zos. 
III. 11 that Julian stayed ten months at Constantinople, and thus post- 
pone his departure for Antioch till September. 



APPENDIX C. 

SYNOPSIS OF LITERATURE UPON JULIAN. 

SECTION I. BIBLIOGRAPHY OF JULIAN'S WORKS. 

Aldus Manutius. Some of the Letters in 'ETrtoroXal bia^topav (piXoa-o- 
ff)a>v prjTopciv (ro(f)i<TTcav, &c. Part 2. Venice, 1499. 

Pet. Martinius. Misopogon and Letters, with Lat. trans. : prefaced 
by a life of JuHan. Paris, 1566. 

C. Cantoclarus. Ccesars, with Lat. trans., &c. Paris, 1577. 

B. Grangibr. French trans, of Ccesars, with abridged Vie de Julien. 
Paris, 1580. 

Duval published in a collected shape the Ccesars by Cantoclarus, the 
Misopogon and Letters by Martin, together with Orat. ii, edited by Can- 
toclarus, and Orat. iv. by Th. Marcilius, who added a Commentary. Paris, 
1583. 

F. Sylburg. Ccesars. Frankfort, 1590. 

P. CuNAEUS. Ccesars, with Lat. trans., at end of his Sardi Venales, tfcc. 
Leyden, 1612. Trans, republished 1632, and with his other writings, 
Leipsic, 1693. 

D. PETAtr. Oratt. i. ll. IIL with Lat. trans, and Commentary. Flfeche, 
1614. All the OratioV'S and Letters, with Lat. trans, and Commentary. 
Paris, 1630. 

Y. Marinerius. Lat. trans. &c. of Orat. iv. Madrid, 1625. 

J. E. RiST'. Ccesars, with German trans, and notes. Hamburg, 1663. 

E. Spanheim. (1) Ccesars trans, into French, with Notes. Heidelberg, 
1660 ; with additions, Paris, 1683 ; and further, Amsterdam, 1728. (2) 
Petau's text (emended) and Lat. trans, of the Eight Orations, the Letter to 
Themistius, Letter to the Athenians, and Fragment of a Letter ; Ccesars, with 
Cantoclarus' Lat. trans. ; Misopogon and Letters, with Martin's Lat. trans. ; 
Cyril's 10 books of Refutation, reprinted from Aubert's 1638 Ed. ; Prefaces 
and Commentaries of Martin, Cantoclarus, Petau and Aubert ; and an 
enormous Commentary on Orat. I. by Spanheim himself. Leipsic, 1696. 

M. P. MoRET. French trans, of Ccesars, &c. Paris, 1682. 

J. A. Fabricius. Unedited Letters of Jul. in Balutaris Lux Evangelii. 
Hamburg, 1731. 

J. M. Heusinger. Ccesars (with Cunaus' and Spanheim's translations) 
with Commentary, and a dissertation by Spon on Julian's coins. Gotha, 1736. 



292 APPENDIX C. 

La Bleterie. Tlistoire de VEmpereur Jovien et Traductions de qtielques 
ouvrages de VEmpereur Julien. Paris, 1748. (The whole of this is practi- 
cally translated by J. Duncombe. See infr.) 

ISIarquis d'Argens. Jvlian against the Christians, with French trans., 
pref. and notes. Berlin, 1764. 

G. F. Zannetto. Ccesars in Italian. Triuigi, 1764. 

D. Wyttenbach. Epistola Critica ad Ruhnkenimn. 1769. 

H. J. Lasius. Ccesars and Misopogon, with Spanheim's pref., German 
trans, and notes. Greifswald, 1770. 

T. C. Harles. Ccesars, with Commentary, &c. Erlangen, 1785. 

T. Taylor. Oratt. iv. v. English trans, with notes. London, 1793. 

J. Duncombe. Translation of the Ccesars, Misopogon, Letters, and various 
selections from Julian's works, with notes from Petau, La Bleterie, Gibbon, 
&c. (Some j)ieces of Libanius are added, and also La Bleterie's 'Life of 
Jovian,' all in English.) 2 vols. London, 1798. 

G. H. ScHAEPER. Text and Commentary of Orat. i., with Petau's trans., 
and reprint of D. Wyttenbach's Epist. Critica. Leipzig, 1802. 

T. Taylor. Argicments of the Emp. Julian against the Christians trans- 
lated, &c. 25 copies privately printed, London, 1809, but reprinted by 
Nevins. London, 1873. 

A. F. Stella. Ccesars, with Italian trans, and commentary. Milan, 
1820. 

E. Tourlet. French trans, of Complete Works with notes, &c., and a 
prefatory life of Julian. Paris, 1821, 

L. H. Heyler. Letters and Fragments, with fuU commentary. Mainz, 
1828. 

Arguments of Celsus, Porphyry, and the Emperor Julian against the 
Christians (with extracts from Lardner's and Bingham's translations). 
London, 1830. 

J. Horkel. Emendationes lulianeae. Berlin, 1841. 

F. C. Hertlein. (1) Emendationes lulianeae. 1847. (2) Kri- 
tische Bemerkungen zu Julianas Schriften. 1850. (3) Coniectaneo, 
Critica in luliani orationes atque epistolas. 1856. (4) Specimen 
novas luliani Caesarum editionis. 1857. (5) Conjecturen zu Griech- 
ischen Prosaikem, p. 15 — 22. 1861. (6) Variae lectiones ad luliani 
Caesares e codd. Parisinis enotatae. Wertheim, 1863. (7) In Hermes 
Vol. in. 309 pp. 1868, Vol. vin. 167 pp. 1874. (8) luliani'^ Impera- 
toris quae supersunt praeter reliquias apud Cyrillum omnia for the Teubner 
series. Leipsic, 1875. 

C. G. CoBET. In Mnemosyne (Leyden) for 1855, Variae Lectt. 312 pp. ; 
ibid, for 1859, Annott. crit. et palaeogr. ad lulianum, 341 pp. ; ibid, for 
1860, Annott. critt. &c. ad lulianum, 1 pp., and Ad luliani o-vixttoo-iov fj 
Kpoi^ia vulgo Caesares, 249 pp. ; ibid, for 1861, Annot. crit. et palaeogr. ad 

^ The references throughout have been made to this edition : for the frag- 
ments contained in Cyril I have used Spanheim's 1696 ed. 



SYNOPSIS OF LITERATURE UPON JULIAN. 203 

lul. oratt.; Ad orat. quae inscrihitur 'Avtioxikos ij Mia-oTrcayav, 164 pp. ; 
ibid, for 1874, lul. locus eorrectus, p. 27 and p. 346 ; Novae lectt. quibus con- 
tinentur observ. crit. in scrip. Graecos repetitae ex Mnemosyne. Leyden, 
1858. 

E. Cauer. Coesars, with Commentary. Breslau, 1856. 

E. Talbot. French trans, of Juhan's Works, complete, with notes, &c., 
preceded by a 'Study' or Essay upon Julian. Paris, 1863. 

C. SiNTENis in Hermes. Vol. i. 1866. 69 pp., p. 144. 

R. Hercher (1) in Hermes. Vol. i. 1866, p. 474; Vol. ii. 1867, 457 
pp.; Vol. XII. 1877, 145 — 6. (2) Letters in the Epistolograplii Oraeci. 
Paris, 1873. 

C. Henning in Hermes. Vol. ix. 1875, 257 pp. 



SECTION II. ANCIENT AUTHORITIES FOR THE HISTORY 
OF JULIAN. 

{In this even more than in the other sections of this Appendix I must express 
my great obligations to Dr J. F. Mucke for his useful and thorough Appendix 
upon the sources for the History of Julian, ) 

§ 1. Contemporary Writers. 

Dates affixed to the names cover in all cases the time during which 
the work referred to must have been written. The editions set down 
are those employed for reference in the body of this work. The arrange- 
ment in each department is, so far as may be, chronological. 

A. Orators, d;c. 

Mambrtinus, 362 a.d. Gratiarum Actio Iidiano Augusto (Migne, 
Patrologia Lot. Vol. 18). Mamertinus (Consul for 362) returns thanks to 
Julian for his nomination to the Consulship. [The Latin Life of Julian 
appended, is I suppose by the Jesuit De La Baune, appearing in his 
Panegyrid Veteres. Paris, 1686.] 

HiMERius. Panegyric delivered at Constantinople, Dec. 362. Wems- 
dorf s texts and notes, re-edited with preface by T. C. Harles. Erlangen, 
1785. 

LiBANius. (1) Orationes et Declamationes. Ed. Reiske. Altenburg, 1791. 
The Ilepi T^s Tificoplas 'lovXiavov, the Upos tovs ^apvv avTov KoKetravTas, 
the IIpos 'hvTioxeas Trepi t^s tov ^acriXeas opyrjs, the ^'EiriTcKpios 'lovXiava 
and a letter or two to Julian are Latinised in Fabricius, Bibliotheca Graeca, 
Vol. vii. ; the 'YTrep rav iepav is Englished in Lardner's Testimonies, 
Vol. IV., and the two Monodies on Nihomedia and The Temple of Daphne in 
Duncombe's Julian and Libanius. (2) Epistolae. Ed. J. C. Wolf. Amster- 
dam, 1738. (Letters to Julian are translated in Duncombe.) 



294f APPENDIX C. 

Greqorius Nazianzenus. Esp. Oratt. iv. v. Contra luUanum. Ed. 
Migne, Patrologia Oraeco-Lat. Vol. 35. 

B. Historians. 

Ammianus Marcellinus. Rerum Oestarum Libri 2 vols. Ed, Gardt- 
hausen. Leipsic, 1874. Far the fullest and best of the old histories. 

EuTROPius (circ. 365 a.d.). Breviarium Historiae Romanae. Lib. x. 
xiv — xvi. Ed. Havercamp. Leyden, 1729. 

Sextius Aurelius Victor. De Caesaribus c. 42, and Epitome de 
Vita et Moribus Imperatorurti Romanorum^ c. 42. 43. Ed. Sam. Pitiscus, 
1696. 

Sextus Rufus, alias Rufus Festus, alias Sextus Rupus Festus (circ. 
372 A.D.). Breviariiom, c. 28. Ed. Havercamp with Eutropius, 1729. 

Jerome (4th Cent., last half). Translatio Chronicorum Eusebii. Lib. ii. 
Ed. Migne, Patrologia Lot. Vol. 27. 

RupiNUS (end of 4th Cent.). Historia Ecclesiastica i. Ed. Migne, 
Patrologia Lat. Vol. 21. 



§ 2. Writers op the 5th to the 14th Century. 

A. Codes. 

Codex Theodosianus. G. Hanel. Bonn, 1842. 
Codex lustiniamcs. 

B. Historians. 

EuNAPius (born 347, outlived 415). (1) Vitae Sophistarum et Fragmenta 
Historiarum. Ed. J. F. Boissonade, with notes by D. Wyttenbach. 2 vols. 
Amsterdam, 1822. (2) Excerpta ex Historia and Fragmenta in Niebuhr's 
Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. I. Bekker and Niebuhr. Bonn, 1829. 

Cyril^ of Alexandria (circ. 410 a.d.). Pro Christiana Religione ad- 
versus lulianum Imperatorem. Ed. with Julian's works by E. Spanheim. 
Leipsic, 1696. 

Philostorgius (368 — 430 a.d.). Ecclesiasticae Historiae, esp. Lib. vii. 
Ed. Migne, Patrologia Graeco-Lat. Vol. 65. 

Orosius (5th Cent, first half). Historiae adv. Paganos. Lib. vii. 
xxix. XXX. Ed. Migne, Patrol. Lat. Vol. 31. 

SoKRATES (5th Cent, first half). Ecclesiastica Historia, esp. Lib. in. 
3 vols. Ed. R. Hussey. Oxford, 1853. 

SozoMEN (5th Cent, first half). Ecclesiastica Historia, esp. Lib. v. Vl. 
3 vols. Ed. R. Hussey. Oxford, 1860. 

1 I have not thought well to include Church Writers (e. g. Chrysostom, 
Augustine, Sulpicius Severus, &c.) or others (e. g. Prudentius) who allude only 
incidentally to Julian and his times. 



SYNOPSIS OF LITERATURE UPON JULIAN. 295 

ZosiMUS (5th Cent, first half). Historia Lib. ill., in Niebuhr's 
Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. I. Bekker. Bonn, 1837. The best and 
most independent of Byzantine accounts. 

Theodoret (circ. 450 A. d.). Ecclesiastiea Historia. Ed. T. Gaisford. 
Oxford, 1853. 

Cassiodorus (6th Cent, first half). Historia Ecclesiastiea Tripartita. 
(sc. from Soz. Sokr. and Theod.) Ed. Migne, Patrologia Lat. Vol. 69. 

loANNES Lydus (490 — 565 A.D.). De Mensibus iv. 75, in Niebuhr's 
Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. I. Bekker. Bonn, 1837. 

loANNES Malalas (6thi Cent.). Chronographia Lib. xiil. pp. 325 — ■ 
334, in Niebuhr's Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. Dindorf. Bonn, 1831. 

Theophanes (6th Cent, second half), Chronographia I. pp. 68 — 82, 
3 vols, in Niebuhr's Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. J. Classen. Bonn, 1839. 

Chronicon Paschale (7th Cent, first half). Lib. i. pp. 541 — 552, 
2 vols, in Niebuhr's Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. L. Dindorf. Bonn, 
1832. 

Ioannes Antiochentts (7th Cent.). Fragments in Miiller, Fragm. 
Hist. Oraec. iv. Paris, 1851. 

Leo Grammaticus (10th Cent.). Chronographia, pp. 91^95, in Nie- 
buhr's Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. 1. Bekker. Bonn, 1842. 

Georgius Kedrenus (11th Cent.). Historiarum Compendium i. pp. 
521 — 539, in Niebuhr's Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. 2 vols. Ed. I. Bekker. 
Bonn, 1838. 

Mich. Glykas (12th Cent.). Annales iv. pp. 466 — 473, in Niebuhr's 
Corpus Script. Hist. Byz. Ed. I. Bekker. Bonn, 1836. 

Zonaras (12th Cent.). Annales xiii. x — xiii. Ed. Migne Patrologia 
Graeco-Lat. Vol. 134. 

NiKEPHORUS (Kallistus) (14th Cent, first half). Ecclesiastiea Historia 
Lib. X. Ed. Migne, Patrologia Graeco-Lat. Vol. 146. 

Acta Martyrum. Ed. Ruinart. Verona, 1731. 



SECTION in. MODERN AUTHORITIES. 

A. Monographs upon Julian. 

S. Johnson^ (Rector of Corringham) under nom de plume Philaretus 
Anthropopolita. Some Seasonable Remarks upon the Deplorable Fall of 
the Emperor Julian, &c. London, 1681. 

S. Johnson, Julian the Apostate being A Short Account of Ms Life^ 
of which a considerable portion is polemic on Divine Right and Passive 
Obedience, London, 1682. To this A Lover of Truth, Virtue and Jus- 

1 Some place him as late as the 9th century, 

^ For an account of " Julian Johnson," in which this controversy is touched, 
see Chap, vi. of Macaulay's Hist, of Eiigland. 



296 APPENDIX r. 

TICE replied in Some Remarques ttpo7i a late Poptdar Piece of Nomence, 
Called Julian the Apostate. This rejcjiiuler elicited an angry Vindicatum 
(with a long abusive title) of 40 pages; issuing from A true Lover of hit 
King, his Country, and the Protestant Religion. London, 1682. This 
was not all the stir made by the original work. Coistantiiis the Apostate 
appeared (London, 1683), examining and rewriting the history to support 
by it the theory of Divine Right : while shortly after A Minister of Religion 
(in reality G. Hicks) replied at greater length and with more learning 
both to the historical and other matter with Jovian, or An Answer 
to Julian the Apostate. London, 1683. Jovian received a meagre criticism 
in A Letter of Remarks upon Jovian by A Person of Quality — (A. Annesley, 
Earl of Anglesey). 

Further, T. Long published (London, 1683), A Vindication of the 
Primitive Christians... against... the Life of Jidian written hy Eceholius the 
Sophist; and J. Dowell, The Triumph of Christianity ; or the Life of CI. 
Fl. Jidian the Apostate. London, 1683. 

S. Johnson issued in Dutch Julianus den Apostaat, of Kort hegrijp van 
zijn Leven. Vrystad, 1688. In 1689 — (the book was ready 1683, but pub- 
lication was prohibited) — he retaliated on opponents with Julian's Arts to 
imdermine and extirpate Christianity, followed by An Ansioer to Co'>istantius 
the Apostate and An Answer to Jovian. Victory rested with Mr Johnson, 
and further tracts Animadversioiis on Mr Johuon^s Answer to Jovian by 
W. Hopkins, D.D. (London, 1691), and in 1692 A Letter to Mr S. Johnson 
from Sir R. Howard occasioned by the Animadversions concern Julian 
very little. 
~' J. P. Oheim. De luliani Imperatoris Apostasia. Leipsic, 1684. 

J. A. Fabricius. Salutaris Lux Evangelii, dec. Cap. xiv., 294 pp. 
Hamburg, 1731. 

P. Gaudentius. lulianus Imp. Philosophus in Meuschen's Vitas Sum- 
morum Virorum, Ii. 65 pp. Coburg, 1735. 

La Bleterie. Vie de VEmpereur Julien. Paris, 1735. The book was 
translated (?by Bower) into English, and published in London, 1746. 

G. F. Gude. De artibus luliani apostatae paganam superstitionem 
instaurandi. Jena, 1739. 

W. Warburton. Julian, or A Discourse concerning the Earthquake 
&c. London, 1750, 

Abbe de la Porte. LJesprit de Jxdien in his L Esprit des Monarques 
Philosophes. Amsterdam, 1764. 

Marquis d' Argens. Defense du paganisms par Vempereur Julien, <kc. 
Berlin, 1764. Criticised by G, F. Meier in Beurtheilung der Betrachtungen 
des Herrn Marquis von Argens iiber den Kayser Julian (Halle, 1764), and 
by W. Crichton Betrachtungen iiber des Kayser JulianJs Abfall von der 
christlichen Religion und Vertheidigxmxg des Heidenthums (Halle, 1765). A 
second enlarged edition appeared in 1767, but the 'new edition' of 1768 



SYNOPSIS OF LITERATURE UPON JULIAN. 297 

yielded to his critics and comprised little more than a trans, of Julian's 
attack on Christianity with not very vohmiinous notes. Third edition of 
the Defense du Pag. again augmented, in 2 vols. Berlin 1769. 

H. P. C. Henke. De Theologia luliani Imperatoris Philosophi in 
Opusc. Acad. p. 353—379. Leipsic, 1802. 

G. F. WiGGERS. {V) De Iidiano Apostata, religionis Christianae et Chris- 
tianorum persecutore. Rostock, 1810. (2) Julian der Ahtrunnige, in 
Zeitschr. fur die Hist. Tlieologie. (lUgen. vol. 7.) Leipsic, 1837. 

S. T. MuECKB. De luliano imperatore scholis Christianorum infesto. 
Schleusinger Programm, 1811. 

A. Neander. Der Kaiser Julian und sein Zeitalter. Leipsic, 1813. 
Translated into English by G. V. Cox, and published by Parker, 1850. 

F. C. Schlosser. (1) A criticism on Meander's work in the Jenaische 
Allgemeine Litteratur-Zeititng, Jan. 1813, 121 pp. Jena and Leipsic. 
(2) Universalhistorische Uehersicht der GescMchte der alien Welt, iii. ii. 
316 pp., 408 pp., and iii. 1—151. Frankfurt am Main., 1830. (3) Article 
in Archiv fur Geschichte und Literatur, Vol. i. 217 — 272, on Univ., Stud, 
u. Prof, der Griechen zu Julianas u. Theodosius' Zeit, &c. Frankfurt am 
Main, 1830. 

M. JoNDOT. Histoire de VEmpereur Jidien. 2 vols. Paris, 1817. 

C. H. VAN Herwerden. De Iidiano Imp., religionis Christianae haste 
eodemque vindice. Leyden, 1827. 

H. ScHULZE. De Philosophia et Moribus Iidiani Apostatae. Stral- 
sund, 1839. 

Teufpel. (1) De luliano Christianismi contemptore et osore. Tubingen, 
1844. (2) 2 Arts. Zur Geschichte des Kaisers Jidian in Zeitschrift fUr Ge- 
schichtswissenschaft, ed. by Dr W. A. Schmidt, Vol. iv. pp. 143 — 161. 
Berlin, 1845. (3) Article lulianus Apostata in Pauly's Bealencyclopadie'^. 

A. Desjardins. VEmpereur Julien. Paris, 1845. 

D. F. Strauss. Der RoTnantiker auf dem Throne der Casaren oder 
Julian der Abtriinnige, 1847. Part V. in the Gesammelte Schriften, I. 
p. 174 — 216. Bomi, 1876. (An article containing the gist of the above 
appeared in the Edinburgh Bevieio, July, 1848.) 

J. Wolf. Kaiser Julian. Teschener Projramm, 1855. 

J. E. AuER. Kaiser Jidian der Abtriinnige im Kampfe mit den Kirchen- 
vcitern seiner Zeit. Vienna, 1855. 

H. Franc. Nature et caracteres de la pole'mique de VEmpereur Julien 
contre le Christianisme. Paris, 1857. 

E. Lame. Julien VApostat. Paris, 1861. 

Kaiser Jidianus der Abtriinnige, two anonymous articles in Hilgen- 
feld's Zeitsch. fiir wissenschaftliche Theologie. Halle, 1861. 

W. Mangold. Jidian der Abtriinnige, ein Vortrag den 19. Feb. 1861 
in Marburg gehalten. Stuttgart, 1862. 

^ I have not gone through the superfluous labour of inserting a list of Eucy- 
clopsfidia Articles, with the uames of their authors. 

R. E. 20 



298 APPENDIX C. 

C. Semisch. Julian der Ahtriinnige. Ein Charahterhild. Breslau, 1862. 

J. F. A. MuECKE. Flavins Claiidius hdianus. Abth. I. JuHaiUs Kriegs- 
thaten. Gotha, 1867. Abth. ii. Julian's Leben nnd Schriften. Gotha, 
1869. 

E. Zeidler. Julian. 1869. 

A. Kellerbauer. Kaiser Julian's Begierung. Kempten, 1876. 

F. Rode. Geschichte der Reaction K. Jvlians gegen die christliche 
Kirche. Jena, 1877. 

H. A. Naville. Jidien I'Apostat et sa Philosophie du PolytMisme. 
Paris, 1877. 



B. Histories, dec. 

{This list does not of course pretend to completeness. I-have only set down the 
most important authorities, adding such of the multitudinous text-hooks of Eccle- 
siastical or Secular History, ' Welt-Geschichten,'' dx., as I have chanced to find 
most useful or accessible.) 

C. Baronius. Annales Ecclesiastici. Lucae, 1739. 

GoTTPR. Arnold. Unparteiische Kirchen- und Ketzerhistorien. Vol. I. 
Bk. IV. i.J 11 ff. Frankfurt am Main, 1699. 

TiLLEMONT. {I) Histoire des Empereurs, &c. Vol. iv. of 5 vol. Ed. Paris, 
1700 — 1704. (3) Mdmoires pour servir d, Vhistoire Eccldsiast. Vol. vii. of 
the second (16 vol.) Ed. Paris, 1701—1712. 

C. DE S. Montesquieu. Considerations sur les Causes de la Grandeur 
des Romains et de leur Decadence. Paris, 1734. 

J. M. ScHROECKH. Christliche Kirchengeschichte. Part 6. Leipsic, 1774. 

E. Gibbon 1. Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. 1787. 

TzscHiRNER. Der Fall des Heidenthu'im. Leipsic, 1829. 

A. Neander. Church History, translated by J. Torrey in Clark's 
Foreign Theol. Library. Edinburgh, 1851. 

RuBDiGER. De statu et conditione Paganorum sub Impp. Christ, post 
Constantinum magnum. Warsaw, 1825. 

J. H. Newman. Arians of the Fourth Century (1833), 4th ed. London, 
1876. 

A. Beugnot. Hist, de la destruction dio Paganisme en Occident. Paris, 
1835. 

E. Chastel. Hist, de la destruction du Paganisme dans VEmpire 
d'Orient. Paris, 1850. 

E. V. LASAUliX, Der Untergang des Hellenismics, &c. Mlinchen, 1854. 

H. Kellner. Hellenismus imd Christenthum, dec. Koln, 1866. 

A. DE Broglie. EEglise et VEmpire Romain au IV' Siecle (1856). 
5th Ed. in 6 vols. Paris, 1867. 

1 Hermathciia, Part 5 (for 1877) devotes an article to Gibbon's treatment of 
Julian. 



SYNOPSIS OF LITEKATURE UPON JULIAN. 299 

H. H. MiLMAN. Hist, of Latin Christianity. Vol. I. 4tli Ed. in 9 vols. 
London, 1867.. 

J. C. EoBERTSON. Hist, of the Christian Church. Vol. i. of 8 vol. Ed. 
London, 1874. 

"W. Bright. Hist, of the Church, 313— 4:51. London, 1860. 

J. W. Drapee. Hist, of the Intellectual Development of Europe. Re- 
vised ed. in 2 vols. London, 1875. 

C. A. Hase. Eirchengeschichte. lOth Ed. Leipsic, 1877. 

P. Smith. JStudenfs Ecclesiastical History. London, 1878. 

As useful subsidiary aids may be mentioned : 

Ullmann. Oregorius von Nazianz der Theologe. Darmstadt, 1825. 
G. E. SiBVERS. Studien zur Oeschichte der romischen Kaiser. Berlin, 
1870. Da^ Lehen des Libanius. Berlin. 

W. W. Capes. University Life in Aticient Athens. London, 1877. 



0. Neo-Platonism. 

E. Zeller. Die Philosophic der Oriechen in ihrer geschichtlichen Ent- 
^oichlung, iii. 2, (Leipzig, 1868), and F. IJEBERWEa, Hist, of J^hilosophy, 
(transl. by G. S. Morris and N. Porter, London, 1872), give all the neces- 
sary authorities. 



D. Fiction. 

H. Ibsen. Keyser og Galilceer (1873), translated as The Emperor and 
the Galilean, by C. Ray. London, 1876. , 

C. Kinqsley's Hypatia perhaps deserves to be added. ^ 



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London : Printed by John Stbangewats, Castle St. Leicester Sq. 

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